


how beautiful your soul is (and your hands)

by drunkonwriting



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Blasphemy, Crowley Was Raphael Before Falling (Good Omens), Dying Crowley, First Kiss, Good Omens Big Bang 2019, Hurt Crowley, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mutual Pining, Post-Apocalypse, Protective Aziraphale (Good Omens), Sharing a Bed, Sickfic, Soulmate type stuff, South Downs Cottage (Good Omens), Supernatural Illnesses, Tenderness, Touch-Starved Crowley (Good Omens)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-10
Updated: 2020-02-10
Packaged: 2021-02-27 20:34:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 32,397
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22631947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/drunkonwriting/pseuds/drunkonwriting
Summary: Aziraphale slowly looks from the knife to Crowley’s face. “Holy water.” His voice sounds distant and strange, as if he’s hearing it from outside of himself. “The knife. It’s coated in holy water.”Crowley’s smile is thin and bitter. “Yes,” he says.In the aftermath of the Apocalypse, Crowley is just trying to find his feet after losing his day job. Unfortunately for him, not every demon was convinced by Aziraphale’s little show during their Trials—and that disbelief proves to be deadly. Aziraphale just wants to read books and revel in a life of freedom. But when Crowley’s hurt, all of his efforts become a race against time to heal him before it’s too late.
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 50
Kudos: 547
Collections: Good Omens Big Bang 2019





	how beautiful your soul is (and your hands)

**Author's Note:**

> written for the good omens bigbang 2019. i started this off with the very simple concept of hurt!crowley being treated tenderly by aziraphale and it kind of spiraled off into it own thing. please heed the tags - crowley is sick and hurt for most of this fic and while there IS a happy ending, this story is angst-heavy. 
> 
> giant, huge shout-out to [gottagobuycheese](https://gottagobuycheese.tumblr.com/) for the amazing artwork. thank you for putting up with my constant radio silence and for coming through with such a beautiful representation of one of my favorite scenes in the whole fic!!! also thanks to morrified for the last minute beta job - you always really come through for me even when i ask for such a quick turn-around and i couldn't appreciate it more.
> 
> if you want the playlist i listened to while writing this you can find it [here](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2OgntRdBBN00Yvno1H79jm?si=PIe_bMhaSdGPp9KV9KHCpQ).

The heart is the toughest part of the body.  
Tenderness is in the hands.  
-Carolyn Forché, _Because One is Always Forgotten_

* * *

Crowley’s walking home because even he knows there’s no point in driving the Bentley to go to the little corner store. Crowley never buys anything at the little corner store. He doesn’t need anything there and even if he did, he wouldn’t buy it there. It’s one of those little dives that still manage to grow like weeds in big cities turning too modern and slick: tiny, with grimy windows and a big CASH ONLY sign, rows scattered with odd, knock-off snacks and toiletries. There’s never an employee in sight that looks even remotely happy to be there. 

Crowley can’t explain his fascination with the place or its regular rotation of customers who range from the destitute to the strange, but he finds himself there so often he’s become a regular himself. If Aziraphale ever finds out that Crowley sometimes likes to spend his Sunday afternoons trolling the dirty, cramped rows of a brightly lit store that sells things like _Creme Betweens_ he’ll probably think Crowley’s lost his mind.

On this particular Sunday, Crowley isn’t thinking about anything in particular. In the months following the near-miss of the Apocalypse, he’s more and more at loose ends—after six centuries of constant monitoring, he’s found himself surprisingly off-kilter at going without it. He’d never tried over-hard at the whole demon thing—not like some demons who took, in Crowley’s opinion, an _unhealthy_ amount of glee in something that should really just be their job—but his stunts always took some thought and work and planning, which usually ate up time. He can still perform temptations, of course, but it’s somehow lost all its flavor. What’s the point in annoying London into sinning when he doesn’t even care if any of them are caught by Hell’s grip anyway?

Crowley’s got his own little hobbies and past-times, obviously. There’s no living on Earth without picking a few of them up and they’re good for passing the centuries. He takes care of the Bentley, he looks after his plants, he goes down to Royal Astronomers Club sometimes and sees what they’re up to. He visits Aziraphale, of course, and spends hours lazing around his shop and helpfully scaring away any potential customers. So it’s not that Crowley’s _bored_ , of course, it’s just that he can’t help thinking he’s been carrying around an awfully heavy weight for most of his life and, having finally set it down, he’s been feeling all—discombobulated. 

He makes a face as he approaches his building. Maybe he’s been hanging around Aziraphale too much if he’s picking up words like _discombobulated_. 

Crowley stiffens as he approaches his building and his idle thoughts—most of them revolving around when discombobulated had even become a word anyway—dissipate. He looks up and down the street outside of his apartment building, neck prickling. No one’s outside and the streets are empty of any cars, though Crowley can hear the distant roar of traffic and honking from the main intersection a few streets down. There’s a cat pussyfooting down the opposite side of the street and a few birds in nearby trees. The wind stirs, blowing leaves past Crowley’s feet.

There’s nothing immediately out of place except a whisper of something—well. 

_Bad_.

Crowley crosses his arms as he ducks into the nearby alley that’s radiating the uncomfortable feeling. As he half-suspected, there’s a patch of darkness on the wall that really doesn’t seem to belong there—it’s too sunny and bright for such a deep shadow. Crowley sneers at it. 

“I know you’re in there,” he says to it. “Come out, this isn’t _Masterpiece Theater_.”

There’s a brief hesitation. “I did have a speech planned,” the figure in the shadows protests. 

“A speech?”

“Well. A threatening diatribe. You know.” The shadow seems rather downtrodden for a shadow. “I worked on it for ages. Even rewrote a time or two. But if you’re that ready to get on with things…”

It might as well be pouting. Crowley rolls his eyes, but even though he’s a demon, he’s not _heartless_. He waves a hand and resigns himself. 

“Oh, go on then.”

The shadow straightens. There’s a brief cough and a rustling of paper.

_“FORMER DEMON CROWLEY,”_ comes a suddenly menacing growl. _“FOR YOUR CRIMES AGAINST SATAN, YOU ARE SENTENCED TO EXTINCTION. YOU ARE A BLIGHT UPON OUR KIND, CROWLEY, A TRAITOR AND—”_

“Hold on,” Crowley says. “So sorry, don’t mean to interrupt, but... Didn’t you lot already sentence me?”

A pause. _“IT WAS DECIDED THAT SENTENCE WAS INCORRECT.”_

“Decided by _who_?”

Yes, there’s a distinctly _shifty_ feeling about the shadow now. Crowley takes a step towards it and it seems to shrink back for a moment before unfolding to a proper height. Now that he’s closer, Crowley can make out more of the shape behind it. Not someone he knows, he thinks, but it’s definitely one of the lower-level demons. Beelzebub probably sent the little idiot to test the waters. It’s probably been driving them mad not to know what Crowley’s been up to.

_“IT IS IRRELEVANT,”_ the shadow says and clears its throat again before continuing in a much deeper voice, “ _YOUR CRIMES CANNOT BE OVERSTATED, FORMER DEMON CROWLEY. YOU HAVE DEFIED AND ATTACKED OUR DARK LORD, YOU HAVE ACTIVELY THWARTED HIS MOST NOBLE PLANS, YOU HAVE MURDERED ONE OF YOUR BROTHERS AND YOU HAVE FRATERNIZED WITH THE ENEMY!”_

Crowley raises his eyebrows. That’s quite a list. “What’s your point?” he asks. 

The shadow loses momentum and any semblance of dignity. _“WHAT’S MY POINT?”_ it shrieks. _“WHAT’S MY POINT? MY POINT, CROWLEY, IS THAT YOU’RE A TRAITOR. A FIEND! YOU—!”_ It shrieks again. “ _YOU’RE A LETDOWN TO THE NAME OF DEMONS EVERYWHERE AND I_ **_HATE YOU_** _!_ ”

Crowley waits. Nothing else seems to be forthcoming.

“Well, then,” he says. “Glad you got that off your chest. Lovely speech, truly inspired, I really do feel quite ashamed of myself now, but I’ve really got other plans—”

“ _PLANS WITH YOUR ANGEL BOYFRIEND?_ ”

Crowley stiffens. Suddenly, he’s not feeling all that good-natured or indulgent any more. He takes another step forward, but the shadow doesn’t shrink back this time. It seems to almost grow. Crowley still can’t make out the shape hiding in it.

“Why?” he asks. “You have some interest in the angel?”

_“MY ONLY INTEREST IN HIS ANNIHILATION. HE IS THE ENEMY.”_

Crowley snorts. “He’s not that bad, once you get to know him.”

_“BLASPHEMY!”_

“Yeah,” Crowley mutters. “That’s what the angels said about saying the truth back in the day, too. Listen, do you _want_ something? Because I’m not interested in being executed and I’ve really got something I need to be—”

_“YOU HAVE NO PLANS, CRAWLY. NOT ANYMORE.”_

“That’s not my name.” Crowley doesn’t like this, not one bit. A low-level demon out to see where things stand—sure, he can understand that, Beelzebub’s always been detail-oriented and centuries of monitoring don’t just go away in a few months. But this doesn’t feel like a test anymore. “Besides, what can you lot do to me? Your worst punishment doesn’t even work on me, remember?”

_“OH?”_ Crowley gets the impression of teeth, though he doesn’t see any. _“SOME OF US AREN’T SO SURE ABOUT THAT.”_

Oh, fuck. If someone’s actually seen through their little trick, then it’s not just Crowley’s ass on the line. He turns, ready to run, already feeling the hum of the Bentley’s engine turning over to race towards him. Something grabs him from the shadows, sticky and tight, turning him back around. Crowley stumbles, swearing as he tries to shake it off.

_“OH, NO,”_ says the shadow. _“YOU AREN’T GETTING AWAY THIS TIME. FORMER DEMON CROWLEY, I SENTENCE YOU—”_

Crowley’s world goes white with sudden and unexpected agony, spiraling out from his stomach. He looks down. There’s a knife sticking out of his belly, black handle wrapped in cloth. A knife shouldn’t be that bad, he thinks, but it feels like his entire body has been lit on fire. He reaches down and touches the hilt. He shouts as it immediately blisters his fingers. He snatches them back and realizes, with dawning horror, that it’s not the knife that’s causing the pain.

It’s the holy water it’s coated in.

_“—TO_ **_DEATH_** _,”_ the shadow says and disappears with a cackle.

* * *

Crowley freezes and waits to burst into flame. 

He waits. And waits. 

Cautiously, he looks down, but his body’s still there. He hasn’t been burned from the inside out or reduced to a mass of dark goo. Crowley frowns. He touches the knife and bites the inside of his cheek so he doesn’t scream when it burns his fingers again. That’s holy water, all right. His fingers are beginning to turn black—there’s nothing else so powerful. But if it’s really on the knife, shouldn’t he be dead?

He can’t touch the hilt, that’s for certain. They must have coated it in the stuff too, those wankers. Crowley won’t be able to take the knife out himself, not without causing some serious damage to his hand. He’ll have to go find something to wrap it in. Maybe he can try tearing his shirt?

There’s a roar from the end of the alley. Crowley turns to find the Bentley waiting for him there, doors already opening. The engine rumbles at him. 

Well. Even if he’s somehow not dead, that doesn’t mean there isn’t any danger. If his folk are going around stabbing mostly innocent demons with holy water knives, there’s no telling what the other side might try on Aziraphale. Crowley needs to warn him that they need to lay low for a while, maybe try to cook up another scheme to keep their respective former offices off their back. Mostly, he just needs to see Aziraphale fussing around his little shop with his own two eyes—the way the shadow had spoken of him made Crowley intensely uneasy.

He takes a step forward. The world slides sideways and sparks sizzle up and down his spine, making him gasp. His vision begins to go dark at the edges. Crowley stops moving and takes several deep breaths. The pain recedes a little and his vision clears. The Bentley rumbles again, more gently. Crowley stares at it. It’s at the end of the alley, barely more than a few meters away. That’s nothing, he tells himself firmly. Besides, it’s not that bad, is it? He hasn’t lost any blood or any limbs. All it is is a measly twenty steps or so. He can do it. 

Crowley braces himself and tries to take another step. This time, he cries out. His legs lock and he tumbles to his knees, jarring the knife still in his belly. It feels like his skin tries to leave his body when that happens and Crowley can’t move, can barely think. He has to kneel on the ground like a dumb animal for several long moments, just attempting to get his breath back. 

When the pain recedes enough that he can think past it, Crowley looks up. The Bentley is still at the end of the alley. It can’t get any closer without widening the alley by quite a bit. Crowley stares at it. What should be barely considered a walk suddenly seems insurmountable. How is he supposed to get all the way over there when simply moving makes his entire body rebel?

Crowley looks down. He’s bleeding around the stuck knife. His shirt is soaked with it and it’s smeared on the ground as well. Crowley frowns at it, bemused. He should be healing already, he thinks. This body isn’t invincible—it can be destroyed with enough force. But after housing a demon for six centuries, it has a certain toughness that human bodies can’t copy—Crowley’s recovered arms and fingers and toes and once, memorably, a whole eyeball. 

It has to be because of the holy water. But if it’s that powerful, why isn’t he already _dead_? It’s very strange. Honestly, Crowley’s not sure what’s going to happen to him, being stabbed with a knife coated in the stuff. He’s not sure any other demon in the history of the world has endured this. He makes a face. Well. At least he’s a pioneer, even if it’s the last thing he’d wanted to be a pioneer of.

Between the blood loss and the holy water in his system, Crowley feels like a time bomb—one of the ones that the action heroes always find ready to go off in two minutes or less. He could explode or turn to goo or just plain bleed out at any moment. Maybe he _shouldn’t_ go to Aziraphale’s. 

The Bentley rumbles again. Crowley remembers the way the shadow had hissed Aziraphale’s name, the caustic way his fellow angels had tried to throw him into the fire without so much as a trial. Crowley has always thought his lot had the lock on being evil nutters, but he’s absolutely sure now that the angels are way, way worse. Whatever the demons will try on him, the angels will visit tenfold on Aziraphale. Crowley can’t just stay here. He has to warn Aziraphale. He has to see Aziraphale.

“Damn it,” he mutters. 

Crowley’s no stranger to pain. He’s been stabbed and shot and poisoned. He’s had his fingers cut off and he lost an eye once. He’s _Fallen from heaven_. But all that experience doesn’t make it any easier to brace for the sheer white-hot lightning that races up his body as he forces himself to stand. He keeps his breathing as steady as he can and focuses on the Bentley. He lets it fill his entire vision and mind and does everything he can to separate his mind from the agony of his body. He makes it four more steps before he stumbles again, bracing himself against the alley wall.

Crowley wishes, not for the first time, that angels and demons really were capable of everything humanity thought they were. He wishes, more specifically, that he could just teleport over to Aziraphale’s flat. But that hadn’t been possible even before they’d become outcasts and he definitely wouldn’t be able to even summon the concentration to try something like under these conditions. But it seems infinitely preferable to making those last ten steps to the Bentley. 

“Um. Is this someone’s car?”

Crowley curses again. The voice, low and female, is almost certainly human. He hears footsteps and turns just as someone rounds the corner of the alley. His vision is still dim, but he can make out a human girl. Crowley’s better with human ages than Aziraphale, but it’s always a little difficult when they’re young—this one looks older than Adam but younger than the witch. She doesn’t see Crowley at first, still frowning at the Bentley, but she must catch him out of the corner of her eye because she jumps like a startled cat. 

“Holy—!” Her mouth drops open. “Um. Oh my _god_! Are you okay?”

“That’s a remarkably stupid question,” he tells her. 

Humans are full of them, of course, and sometimes Crowley even finds it charming, but he’s not exactly bursting with patience at the moment. The girl grimaces.

“Yeah fine, asked and answered,” she says. “Dude, you have a _knife_ in you.”

Crowley waves a hand at her and nearly blacks out. “That’d be because I’ve been stabbed,” he says. “Now, shoo. It’s no business of yours, is it?”

Her mouth is open again. That can’t be healthy.

“Uh. You’ve been _stabbed_.”

“Just a bit,” Crowley assures her. “I’m sure I’ll get over it soon.”

Not bloody likely, but if he tells this girl that she’ll probably pass out. She already looks wan and wide-eyed. 

“Jesus Christ,” she breathes, as if that unfortunate sod has anything to do with it. “We need to call an ambulance—”

“ _No_.”

She jumps. Crowley’s voice had gone too deep. He forces himself to smile at her, the one he always uses when he needs humans to trust him. To the girl’s credit, she doesn’t seem to fall for it. Of course Crowley has to find a _rebellious_ human on the one day he really needs a pliable one.

“I’ll be just fine,” he says. “I’ll just take my car right there—do you see it? Right there—to the hospital. Nothing for you to concern yourself with.”

Her eyebrows rise. “Oh, yeah?” she asks, skeptical. “How’re you going to make it to your car then, guy? You look like you’re going to pass out.”

“ _You_ look like you’re going to pass out,” Crowley mutters. 

He braces himself, but the pain is still almost too much for him. He tells himself to focus on the Bentley, to remember that this movement is temporary, that if he can just get these steps down he can be _done._ He just needs to power through this little stretch and then he can lay down and never move again and oh fuck, he’s falling—

The girl catches him. She’s shorter than he is, but stockier—she barely even wobbles as she hefts Crowley up under his armpits. She examines his face. Up close, she’s older than he thought she was, with dark skin, clear, dark eyes, and an unamused mouth. 

“You’re in no shape to drive,” she tells him frankly. “Let me take you.”

Crowley balks. The Bentley revs the engine sharply. The girl looks over at it in confusion. 

“Absolutely not,” Crowley says and ignores the hiss creeping into his voice. “No one drives that car but me.”

“Well, buddy, I hate to tell you this but if you try to drive that car, I’m pretty sure you’re going to drive yourself into a car accident. Kind of defeats the purpose of going to the hospital, doesn’t it?”

Crowley can’t really explain to her the instinctive ball that forms in his chest at the thought of anyone, _anyone_ , behind the wheel of the Bentley. His car, his escape route, being taken over, taken out of his hands? Even worse, taken by someone he doesn’t even know, a human he’s just met. Crowley’s back is breaking out in cold sweat at the mere idea. 

“No,” he says. “I’m fine, I can drive myself.”

She looks like she wants to keep arguing with him, but she lets out a short, harsh breath instead.

“You’re worse than some of my mates when they’re drunk,” she tells them. “Come on, then, let’s get you over there.”

She’s much stronger than Crowley expects—she gives him a three-second count and then frog marches them to the Bentley. The insurmountable distance is easily crossed, but Crowley’s entire body is going numb as he settles against the Bentley’s hood. His head is woozy too, and the black spots dancing in front of his eyes are growing larger and darker. How much time does he really have? He pushes down the rising panic and sternly tells himself to get a grip.

“Now, where are your keys?”

“No keys,” Crowley says. “It starts itself.”

“What, it’s an electric car? This old thing? You must’ve upgraded it, huh?” The girl hums. “All right, let’s just get you—”

Crowley uses the last reserve of energy he has to topple past her into the driver’s seat. He closes the door just in front of her grasping hand. The girl ducks down to glare at him through the window. He can’t hear what she’s saying, but he can tell she’s shouting. Crowley wants to roll his eyes and tell her to buzz off, but he’s too busy trying not to throw up. That last move really wrenched everything in his body sideways. 

He’s so preoccupied that he actually jumps when the passenger door opens. He doesn’t have time to do anything as the girl slams into the passenger seat, mid-sentence.

“—get your fool ass killed and I will _not_ have that on my conscience, so I am coming with you in this death trap and so help me God, we might actually make it to the hospital alive.”

“Go _away_ ,” Crowley tells her between gasps.

She glares at him. “If I let you go like this, I’m going to see you on the evening news,” she says. “Fuck that. I’ll keep you from getting into a car accident, so all you have to do is stay alive until we can get you to a doctor, all right?”

Crowley wants to protest. He wants to shove her out of the car, actually, but to his surprise, the doors around them all lock simultaneously. Crowley looks incredulously at the Bentley’s dashboard—does it actually _want_ the human to stay in the car?—but the engine revs and they’re off at a speed that Crowley normally considers a good time and currently makes him want to hurl or scream.

“What the—” The girl’s hands slam against the dashboard. She blinks at where the Bentley’s wheel is clearly turning itself. “It’s a self-driving car?” she asks, almost more to herself. Her eyes narrow on Crowley. “You could have said something.”

“I _did_ ,” Crowley says. “Told you to buzz off.”

“I don’t know what world you live in, but I’m not the kind of person who just lets a guy with a knife in his stomach wander away on his own.”

Damn good Samaritans. Crowley’s always hated them. 

They join the mid-afternoon traffic. Crowley’s not sure if it’s his influence or not, but the Bentley drives like they always do—fast, wild, without a care for pedestrians or traffic laws. Within five minutes, the girl’s clenching the door and swearing under her breath. But even with his body starting to shut down, the Bentley is still full of its magic—they don’t hit anyone and no cops start coming after them. They flow smoothly between cars as if the traffic isn’t there at all.

“There, turn there— Where the hell are you going? The hospital’s _that_ way!”

The girl points a furious finger at the turn they’ve just passed. Crowley sighs. Sitting down feels much better than standing did, even at the speed the Bentley is going, but the pain is only distant, not gone. The brightness and heat of it is growing. It’s almost like Crowley can feel it in his blood now coursing through him and setting his very skin on fire. The holy water’s beginning to take effect—it must have entered his bloodstream when he was stabbed. It’s been cycling through him, getting deeper and deeper into his body and tearing through his cells. Crowley’s not sure how long it’s going to take to tear through him entirely, but he can’t afford to wait around and find out.

Besides. It’s not like any human doctor is going to know what to do with him anyway.

“We’re not going to the hospital,” he says. 

“Oh _fuck_ me. Then where _are_ we going?”

“A bookshop,” Crowley says and the Bentley drives faster.

* * *

Aziraphale’s favorite day of the week is Sunday and no, it doesn’t really have anything to do with that day of rest thing the humans decided on. Or it does, if only that Sundays are usually the days where Aziraphale won’t see anyone in the shop at all and can focus on what he loves best—reading and looking after his books.

The shop is largely unchanged after its miraculous re-manifestation, though Aziraphale did notice a rather larger stock of environmental science books and mystery novels than he had before. There’s also the smell of lemon clinging to every available surface, which Aziraphale would resent for making his bookshop more pleasant to potential customers, but Crowley had taken a sniff and muttered something about it being nice, so now Aziraphale’s taken to spritzing the place with lemon freshener every once in a while and wiping down the counters with lemon polish. Even so, he keeps the windows shuttered and the lights dimmed and hopes, as he does every day, that no one will find anything about his shop interesting in the slightest.

For most of the morning, he loses himself in one of the environmental books Adam created, an interesting diatribe on the current climate changes. Aziraphale’s been largely ignoring those, too distracted in the past twelve years or so by the actual Apocalypse, but now that they’ve thwarted it, perhaps it’s time to pay more attention to the damage humans are doing to themselves. He’s not sure what, if any, miracles he can perform, but surely some of these wealthy CEOs could be persuaded to change their policies…? 

Aziraphale wonders if Crowley would help him. They’ve never tag-teamed a miracle or temptation before and the thought of it makes something jitter in Aziraphale’s stomach. He’s never really seen Crowley in action before, honestly. In the Garden, he was much too far away to get any real idea of what was happening and ever since they’ve always been so cautious of being seen together that he’s only heard of Crowley’s exploits secondhand. What _does_ Crowley look like when he’s tempting someone? When he’s performing a minor miracle? Aziraphale’s surprised by how much he really wants to know.

The door to the shop bangs open, distracting Aziraphale entirely from his thoughts. He looks up and frowns. A young woman stands in the door to his shop, her hands on her hips. She might be around Anathema’s age, which is enough to send Aziraphale’s relaxed mood into a tailspin. He loathes young customers. They never know what they want and they always waste his time by spending hours in the shop just browsing and browsing. Their sole redeeming feature is that they usually don’t actually buy anything.

Aziraphale closes his book with a sigh. So much for a quiet day.

“Miss?” he asks, hoping his flat tone is enough to emphasize how little he wants her to be there. “Is there something I can help you find?”

“You the angel?”

Aziraphale blinks in surprise. Looks her over again, from her heavy dreadlocks to her bright red sneakers. He reaches out with his senses, even, just in case she’s just hiding anything particularly well. But no, she remains totally human. But then, how on earth would she know about him? Is she one of Adam’s friends?

“Excuse me?” he asks, utterly bemused.

The girl makes a face at him. “Look, I don’t mean to be rude, but if you’re not him then I can’t waste any time with you. He won’t go to the hospital without seeing some angel guy first and I’m pretty sure he is actually going to die in that crazy car of his if we don’t get him to a doctor soon, so—”

Aziraphale stands up so quickly he knocks his book off the counter. 

“His crazy car?” he asks. There’s only one person he knows who has one. “You can’t mean _Crowley_ , can you?”

“Tall, skinny guy with dark glasses? Red hair?” The girl frowns at him. “He drives one of those really old-fashioned cars. It’s outside, he’s not, uh. He’s—” 

Aziraphale rounds the desk at a run before she can finish. The girl lets him pass her and Aziraphale’s heart stops when he sees the Bentley parked haphazardly in front of the shop, half on the sidewalk, half on the street. The passenger side door is still open, so Aziraphale can also see Crowley sitting in the driver’s seat, head tilted back and one hand covering his stomach. He looks almost relaxed, but there’s something _wrong_ with him. Aziraphale can feel it even at this distance—something dark and oozing where Crowley’s normal sulfur and menace feeling should be. Aziraphale doesn’t hesitate to scramble in the car through the passenger side.

Crowley’s head lolls to the side. He smiles.

“What’s good, angel,” he says.

“Crowley?” Aziraphale demands. He reaches out and hesitates, hands hovering over Crowley’s body. If Crowley’s hurt, he doesn’t want to make it worse. “What’s wrong?” he demands. “What’s happened?”

“Bit of an incident,” Crowley says. “Seems someone figured out our little trick.”

Aziraphale’s worry deepens. Crowley sounds far away, almost as if he’s not paying any attention to what he’s saying. His s’s are long and sibilant in the way they only get when he’s drunk or furious. And his face is so, so pale. 

“They figured out we switched places?” he asks. “ _How_?” 

“Dunno,” Crowley says. “But even if it was just a guess before, they’ve definitely worked it out now.”

He hesitates. Aziraphale can’t see his eyes, but those are his worried eyebrows, the ones that say he’s not sure how Aziraphale’s going to react to whatever’s going to happen next. Carefully, he lifts his hand from his stomach. Aziraphale looks down and freezes, ice radiating out from his chest. He blinks several times, checking if this some sort of hallucination or fever dream, but nothing changes.

There’s a _knife_ in Crowley’s gut, buried to the hilt.

The knife itself isn’t that big. It looks like something someone might use in a kitchen. The area around it is soaked with blood that’s much darker than it should be. Aziraphale reaches down and touches the hilt with one finger. Something about it feels strange, but Crowley’s low, pained noise makes him snatch the finger back before he can figure out what. Aziraphale looks at Crowley’s tense face and clenched jaw and his chest tightens so much that he almost feels like he’s the one who’s been hurt. 

“Who did this?” Aziraphale’s voice comes out much lower than he expects. 

It’s beyond belief that a human would be able to get one up on Crowley, but Aziraphale’s lived among them long enough to know that they’re much wilier than they seem. 

It takes Crowley several moments to respond. He says it through pants, teeth gritted and eyebrows pinched.

“My lot. Said something. About execution. New sentence.”

Aziraphale’s stomach twists into a ball that grows tighter and tighter with every new word Crowley manages to get out. They’d assumed after their joint stunt that they were released from the burden of oversight from their offices, that they could now live their lives as they saw fit. They’d thought they were safe, that they’d have decades, if not centuries, before anyone attempted to come after them again.

Clearly, Aziraphale thinks, they were too confident by half. 

“Knives aren’t exactly Hell’s weapon of choice,” he says. He looks down at it again, even though he doesn’t really want to. It’s really not that large and it doesn’t seem like Crowley’s bleeding that much. How is this an execution? “Why haven’t you healed yourself already?”

Crowley looks at him. When he’d first adopted the dark glasses, Aziraphale had struggled to read his face and expressions, trying to parse every little tick of his eyebrow and twitch of his cheek to get some idea of what this strange creature, half-friend and half-enemy, was thinking. He’d come up wrong so much of the time, despite his best efforts. He’s become much better at it, of course, after so many years of practice. But right now, even with all of his expertise, he can’t understand what Crowley’s thinking. His mouth is pursed and his eyebrows are drawn down, bitter. His cheek is tense, almost twitching. All Aziraphale can tell is that whatever Crowley’s about to tell him, he knows Aziraphale won’t like it.

“Angel.” Crowley’s voice, to Aziraphale’s surprise, is low and soft, almost gentle. “I can’t pull it out. I can’t heal myself.”

Aziraphale frowns at him. “Why not?”

Crowley reaches out and takes Aziraphale’s wrist, pulling his hand to the knife. Aziraphale recoils, not wanting to cause Crowley any more pain, but Crowley forces him to touch the hilt, trapping Aziraphale’s hand under his to keep him from pulling away.

“Can’t you feel it?” he asks.

“Feel what?”

Aziraphale can’t really feel anything but Crowley’s cool fingers over his own, trapping his hand in place. Crowley’s always run much colder than a normal human, probably another holdover from his time as a snake. His fingers are dry and callused at the tips. Does Crowley play an instrument? Aziraphale can’t imagine it, but he doesn’t know what else would give Crowley calluses.

“Angel.” Crowley’s voice is quiet but sharp. “ _Look_.”

Aziraphale frowns at him but obediently turns his attention to the knife. It seems to be an ordinary thing, hardly worth all this fuss. He examines it and, when that yields nothing, reaches out with his senses. He recoils sharply, drawing his hand away and knocking Crowley’s fingers from his. Aziraphale can’t even mourn the loss, because he’s too busy staring in horror, stomach sinking all the way to the ground. That can’t be, he thinks. It absolutely can’t.

Crowley sighs. “It keeps burning my fingers,” he says quietly. “That’s why I can’t take it out. And the girl wouldn’t because she thought I’d bleed out.” His mouth quirks. “She’s probably right. Don’t know what it’s doing to me, really.”

Aziraphale slowly looks from the knife to Crowley’s face. “Holy water.” His voice sounds distant and strange, as if he’s hearing it from outside of himself. “The knife. It’s coated in holy water.”

Crowley’s smile is thin and bitter. “Yes,” he says. 

There’s a high ringing sound in Aziraphale’s ears. He stares at Crowley’s unamused face, the dark tilt of his eyebrows and the purse of his mouth. He looks down at the knife, innocuous and small. He looks back at Crowley’s face. 

“They coated it in holy water?” Aziraphale asks. “They—They truly—”

He’s not sure what’s happening to his vision. It’s going white at the edges, almost hazy. The air feels hot and heavy, as if he’s standing next to a fire. Crowley’s bitter eyebrows rise and his mouth opens in surprise. He reaches out and takes Aziraphale’s lapels. 

“Angel,” he says. “Calm down.”

“Calm _down_?” Aziraphale asks. His voice is much sharper than he expects it to be. “You’ve been stabbed! With a holy water knife! How am I supposed to calm down, pray tell?”

“Angel,” Crowley says. He doesn’t have any of his usual bark and bite and it’s not _right_. Crowley shouldn’t sound so defeated. “It’s holy water. I can’t—imagine my way out of it. We don’t have that many hard rules, but this is one—it kills us. There’s nothing to bargain or—or wish about.”

”We stopped an Apocalypse,” Aziraphale reminds him, “They said that was inevitable too.”

Crowley’s face does something that implies Aziraphale is a bit of an idiot.

“We didn’t do anything,” he says.

“You stopped Satan!”

” _Stopped_ him? I put him on pause,” Crowley says. “And it’s not remotely the same. He’s the boss, but he’s one of our kind. This isn’t.”

Crowley’s voice breaking convinces Aziraphale where no argument could. He’s never heard Crowley sound like that, not in 6,000 years. He lurches forward, wanting to—he doesn’t even know what. But Crowley groans, face twisting.

“Crowley? Crowley, what is it?”

“My liver,” Crowley says between his pants. “It’s failing.” He looks at Aziraphale. His mouth is still tense and pained but his eyebrows have softened. “Won’t be long now.”

Aziraphale knows what panic is. He hasn’t felt it all that often—it’s really more of a human thing—but he became intimately familiar with it during the Apocalypse when everything seemed to be going wrong in the most horrible of ways.

What he’s feeling right now isn’t panic. It’s not just his stomach throbbing with unease, it’s his whole body. His face has gone numb, his mind—normally very quick, he likes to think—reduced to utter silence except for one piercing thought—

Crowley’s dying.

Aziraphale had thought he’d come to his own terms with the idea back in the 60s when he realized how utterly determined Crowley was to get his hands on holy water. He spent weeks and weeks obsessively moving books around the shop, eating everything he could get his hands on, and having a number of ill-advised encounters as he tried to work out his feelings on Crowley ever needing to use holy water or having it in his possession. He came out of that haze knowing he’d rather Crowley have the security blanket if it was really causing him so much distress and equally sure that if Crowley really was dooming himself to death, Aziraphale didn’t know if he could stay close anymore.

The whole process—and the following decades of ever-present worry lingering in the back of his mind that Crowley had done something terrible to himself without Airaphale knowing about it—had been harrowing enough. But it pales in comparison to the agony he’s going through now.

“Listen, I don’t know what the hell you guys are doing, but he needs a hospital, like, an hour ago.”

Aziraphale jumps. Crowley groans. They both look to find the human girl peering through the still open passenger-side door, utterly unimpressed with both of them.

“Oh dear,” Aziraphale says. He’d quite forgotten they were out in the open. “We need to get you inside.”

“No, not inside the _bookshop_ , he—what the hell are you doing?”

Aziraphale ignores her as he slides out of the passenger side and opens the driver’s door. 

“Come along, my dear,” he says. 

Crowley’s always been taller and slimmer than Aziraphale, built on lean lines. Aziraphale’s never admitted to anyone, not even himself, how much he likes it. But his stomach wobbles a little as Crowley folds easily on his arm, so light it’s difficult to suppress the feeling he might just blow away in the wind. Crowley leans heavily into him as Aziraphale pulls him from the car. The Bentley’s doors close with a gentle click and it slowly backs up until it’s parked more evenly on the curb. The young woman next to the bookshop’s door gapes at it, but Aziraphale pays it little mind.

Aziraphale expects Crowley to make wounded noises as he shuffles them to the bookshop. But he’s utterly silent as they walk, aside from his ragged breath in Aziraphale’s hair. By the time they make it to the door, Aziraphale’s taken on almost all of Crowley’s weight, bracing him with an arm across Crowley’s lower back. 

“You’re seriously not going to bring him to a hospital?” the girl asks.

“Whyever would we do that? Aziraphale asks, nonplussed, as he herds Crowley to the couch stashed amidst the stacks. 

The girl stares at him and then points emphatically to the knife in Crowley’s stomach. “He’s been _stabbed_ **!”** She throws up her hands and mutters to the ceiling. “Have I gone into some kind of alternate dimension? Is this a new world where stab wounds don’t kill people?”

“She’s dramatic,” Crowley mutters into Aziraphale’s hair and Aziraphale huffs.

“Most humans are dramatic about people being covered in blood,” he says. 

The bookstore couch is comfortable and long enough to support most of Crowley’s height. Aziraphale hadn’t meant to have a couch that was comfortable for someone who had been, until recently, his arch-enemy, but he’d never been able to bring in a couch that was any smaller or less suited to Crowley’s comfort. Crowley hisses through his teeth just a little as he lays down on it. 

“Well then,” Aziraphale says. He surveys Crowley thoroughly. His panic is not helped by Crowley’s paleness or the way his mouth is tight against the pain. He’s still bleeding, even. “First thing’s first, I suppose. That knife needs to come out.”

“You can’t do that!”

Aziraphale glances back. He’s surprised the girl’s still with them at this point. He considers telling her to get out of the shop - what he’s about to try probably shouldn’t be seen by human eyes - but then again, it’s not like he has a head office to answer for that sort of thing anymore. He doesn’t have the energy to spare to argue with her, not if he’s going to do anything about Crowley.

“The longer it stays in you, the longer the…” he glances at the girl, “poison stays. Removing it will stop it from spreading through your body, at the very least.”

“You really think that matters?” Crowley asks. He doesn’t sound like he normally does when they argue, even good-naturedly—he only sounds tired. “I told you, angel. There’s nothing you can do for me. I wouldn’t have come at all, but I had to warn you.”

“Warn me?”

“They knew about me,” Crowley says. He shifts, just a little, on the couch. “They might know about you, too.”

Crowley really is all kinds of inconceivable, Aziraphale thinks. He gets betrayed by one of his fellows, stabbed with one of the worst things a demon can be hurt by, is _slowly dying_ , and he still has enough goodness in him to come roaring after Aziraphale to make sure he’s all right. Is it any real wonder, Aziraphale thinks, that he’d betray heaven for Crowley?

“I do believe,” Aziraphale says, “the one with the knife in his stomach should worry about himself.”

Crowley’s mouth is at its most obstinate. His chin juts out. “They were ready to burn you,” he says. Crowley’s usual nonchalance is completely gone. He’s speaking as he did during the last few hours of the Apocalypse—focused, intent. “They didn’t even… There wasn’t even a _trial_. Even my lot did a trail, farce that it was. Why wouldn’t I be, be—”

Aziraphale sinks down on the sofa. His knees protest, but he wants to be level with Crowley. This close, he can see a tiny version of himself reflected in Crowley’s sunglasses.

“I’ll be fine, my dear,” he says. “I haven’t heard a peep from the head office since Adam set the world right and, well…” He glances at the shelves around them. “The shop is rather better protected these days.”

He’s not sure _what_ Adam did to the shop, exactly, but he knows that so far it’s pushed out two people who tried to sneak out books under their jackets with excessive wind. He’s not sure exactly what it would do to anyone who tried to harm Aziraphale instead of just stealing his books, but he’s not going to bet the combined force of Heaven’s angels against the imagination of an inventive eleven-year-old. The angels don’t stand a chance.

“It’s not me we need to worry about,” he continues. “It’s you.”

Holy water isn’t a joke. There’s a reason Aziraphale spent so long denying Crowley—he’s never seen a demon come into contact with it and survive. It’s already a miracle that Crowley hasn’t disintegrated to the wind already, but Aziraphale’s never seen holy water used as a poison before. Usually, it’s been more of the dunking they attempted during Crowley’s trial. He’s not sure he believes the demons he met down below are capable of this kind of subtlety or restraint, and the fact that they were able to procure more holy water at all is worrisome. 

But the particulars aren’t important. Right now, what matters is that even though Crowley’s still walking and breathing and talking, at any moment he might turn to ash. Aziraphale has to focus, has to set aside his growing panic and, most importantly, he has to save Crowley.

He has to.

“Oh _no_ ,” Crowley says. His vehemence is undercut by the way his voice trails off, as if it hurts to speak. “I know _that_ look. I’m not a bicycle, angel. You can’t miracle me better and stick some gears on me.”

“Well, I can’t very well stand around and let you go to pieces on my favorite sofa,” Aziraphale says. 

He wants it to come out lightly to keep the atmosphere from becoming too dire, but it’s no use—his voice breaks on _pieces_. He doesn’t want Crowley to expire. What is he going to do without Crowley to come to his shop and hang around asking ridiculous questions and scaring customers away? Who will he go to dinner with, go to the movies with, share his drinks with? 

Crowley sighs. “You _know_ —”

“No!” Aziraphale shouts, but that’s because sometimes shouting is the only way to keep Crowley from just talking right over you. “I _don’t_ know and neither do you! You should be dead already from just touching that, that— _vile stuff_ , but you’re not. All I _do_ know is that if we’re going to save you, we need to do something, and soon.”

Crowley’s shoulders shift and he grimaces. He turns his cheek, considering the stacks over Aziraphale’s shoulders. He really is becoming alarmingly pale. 

“Might be time,” Crowley says. 

Aziraphale’s stomach swoops. “ _Excuse me_.”

“I don’t want it,” Crowley continues as if Aziraphale hadn’t spoken. “Living’s much better. I’m just _saying._ We were all supposed to die back in the Apocalypse. If everything had gone to plan, we would’ve. Maybe these last few months, all they’ve been is—I don’t know. Borrowed time.”

Aziraphale can’t believe what he’s hearing. No, not just that—he refuses to listen to any such nonsense.

Gently, he reaches out with both hands. Keeping his eyes on Crowley’s face, he unhooks his glasses from behind his ears, sliding them down his nose and off of his face. Crowley doesn’t stop him or bat him away. As always, his eyes are a shock and a fascination. Aziraphale’s seen them so rarely in recent years that he sometimes feels like Crowley is utterly naked without his glasses. 

Crowley’s pupils dilate in the dim light. The corners of his eyes are leaking blood in tiny droplets. Aziraphale’s heart contracts painfully. He sets down Crowley’s glasses, folding them neatly, then reaches for him again.

He traps Crowley’s head between his palms, caging him so lightly that it would only take the smallest turn of his head to break Aziraphale’s hold. Crowley doesn’t move. His hair is thick and rough beneath Aziraphale’s fingers, like a cat’s. Aziraphale’s pinky rests on the vulnerable curve of Crowley’s right ear. 

“You are not allowed to die,” Aziraphale tells him, looking directly into his wide eyes. “I absolutely forbid it.”

  
_You are not allowed to die_ by [gottgobuycheese](http://www.gottagobuycheese.tumblr.com)

Crowley blinks. As he opens his mouth—Aziraphale can feel the shift and flex of his jaw under the heel of his hand—Aziraphale sharpens his focus and attempts a miracle.

Performing miracles has been so integral to Aziraphale for so long that he doesn’t really know how to describe the process. Can most humans describe the steps of how they yawn or tap their fingers? A miracle is a reaction, a reaching. Aziraphale has always been able to do it like breathing. But a miracle like this isn’t like fixing a broken bicycle—for one, he has no real idea of how to heal Crowley. For two, he’s fairly certain angels aren’t supposed to perform miracles on demons.

Maybe that’s why he can feel the strain right away, like he’s pulling hard at something that’s decidedly stuck. Aziraphale loses any sense of time and place and even his human body as he pulls and pulls and _pulls_.

_Lord_ , Aziraphale thinks. _He is your own, Fallen as he is. Spare him. Lord, he should not die._

Silence, as ever. Aziraphale has become used to silence. He pulls again, more fiercely, but it doesn’t work; the darkness, the taint, that crowds Crowley’s body refuses to leave, refuses to move. Aziraphale wraps his hands in it.

_Didn’t we save your world?_ He thinks, more nastily. He can feel himself faltering, becoming weaker. He’s draining himself like this. _Didn’t we fulfill your plan? Your_ real _plan? You owe us this!_

No answer, no sign of anyone listening. Aziraphale’s desperation grows. It won’t shift, it won’t change. It’s spreading through Crowley’s body like a growth, blooming in his blood and traveling through him. His organs are failing. When his heart does… When it does, Crowley will die just like a human and he won’t be coming back again. 

_Please,_ Aziraphale begs. 

He doesn’t know how long he attempts the miracle, but when he returns to himself, he’s panting almost as deeply as Crowley, covered in sweat. At some point, his grip on Crowley’s head firmed. Aziraphale’s fingers are threaded through Crowley’s rough-soft hair now, tightly enough that it must be painful. He’s growing it long again. 

Crowley’s wide eyes are fixed on Aziraphale’s face. 

“What did you do?” he demands. 

Aziraphale doesn’t know, not really. He takes stock and finds that his body is running hot, full of nausea and phantom aches. There’s a sharp, shooting pain behind his right eye. 

“Angel?” Aziraphale’s woozy, even. He might pass out. Crowley reaches out and takes his shoulder in a light grip. “ _Aziraphale_. What did you _do_?”

Aziraphale’s too woozy to pause before he loosens his grip and runs a soothing hand through Crowley’s hair, from his crown to his nape. To his surprise, Crowley shudders, eyes fluttering. Aziraphale pauses, discombobulated, then pulls his hands back quickly, flushing. For a long moment, he and Crowley stare at each other. Aziraphale can’t tell which of them is feeling more off-center. 

“What,” someone says behind them, “the _hell_ was that?”

Oh, fuck, Aziraphale thinks. He forgot about the human.

* * *

Aziraphale’s trying to comfort the human, Crowley thinks, but he’s not really paying attention to their conversation. He’s too busy trying to take stock.

Crowley’s knowledge of his human body is vague. He knows what it needs but he’s never really cared much about providing beyond what it needs to continue to function. He eats because Aziraphale likes to invite him to dinner and sometimes Crowley can find food that makes his mouth tingle and servers eye him in interesting ways. He doesn’t care much about drinking other than alcohol and he’s never exercised or done any of the things humans do to keep their bodies in optimal shape. The only human body function he’s ever enjoyed is sleep. Even in the past, when he’d been injured, he never had to do more than wait it out. 

The last hour or so has been entirely new. He could feel the way his body had been shutting down, organ by organ. Liver and kidneys and intestine—they had all been going. Crowley’s never felt anything like it before, never been in pain like that before. By the time Aziraphale got him on the sofa in the bookstore, he had barely been able to see, barely able to think. Everything had been burning.

He didn’t want to die then, doesn’t want to die now. But he understands a little bit more now, why humans might beg for death, might go to it with their hearts open. When pain becomes that big, anything to make it stop seems like salvation.

But now, _now_ —He can’t stop examining his own body, checking internal processes that he’d barely even thought about before. The pain isn’t gone, but the burn of it has subsided into a low, full-body ache. His vision is clear. He doesn’t feel like one wrong move will send him shaking to pieces.

What did Aziraphale _do_?

“Well,” Aziraphale says with a huff, sitting down on the sofa next to Crowley. “What a determined girl.”

Crowley wants to make fun of him for being given the run-around by a human, but he can’t summon the energy. He reaches out and picks up his glasses. Putting them on makes him feel more like himself. 

“It’s not gone,” he says.

Aziraphale’s silent for so long that Crowley glances at him. His face is paler than it should be, dark smudges under his eyes. His hair is drooping against his forehead. He looks as sick as Crowley feels. It’s not right. Crowley almost reaches for his hand but stops himself before he can move. 

“No,” Aziraphale says finally. “No, it’s not. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry?”

“It was supposed to work. I was supposed to heal you.”

“Supposed to—Angel, there’s no _healing_ me.”

Aziraphale’s mouth tightens into a firm line. Stubborn idiot. “I did something, didn’t I? Maybe the only thing that can save a demon from holy water is an angel.”

Crowley eyes him over. “Looks like it took a fair bite out of you to even try it,” he says. “And it’s still not gone. Not even close. If it was just a bit of upstairs assistance I needed, don’t you think it’d be easier to pull off?” He shakes his head. “No. Whatever you did, it’s—I don’t know. A stop-gap. Bit of a plug in the old drain. But it’s not fixed.”

“So what if it isn’t?” Aziraphale demands. “You’re better now, aren’t you? I gave you more time, didn’t I? Time is better than nothing, surely!” When Crowley says nothing, he falters. “You… Crowley, you do feel better, don’t you?”

Someone needs to save Crowley from those big blue eyes. But he does feel better. His organs aren’t failing anymore, at the very least. But it’s not going to last forever. For one, he still has a knife in his stomach.

“I thought as much,” Aziraphale says, though Crowley didn’t say any of that out loud. “Well. We’d better take care of that knife now. Do you think you can heal it?”

Crowley makes a considering noise from the back of his throat. He hasn’t really used any of his normal tricks in the past few months. Miracles, temptations—none of it. He’s still not really sure how much the office can affect his powers. He might be able to stitch up the hole in his stomach quickly enough to prevent his body from bleeding out or he might not. 

“Absolutely,” he says. Then, when Aziraphale raises his eyebrows, he rolls his eyes and makes a face. “ _Fine_. Probably.”

“I think I have some bandages around here somewhere,” Aziraphale says doubtfully. “We need to plug up the wound, don’t we? Stop the bleeding?”

“Should’ve kept the girl around,” Crowley says. “She’d probably know.”

“Oh, she’s stopping by tomorrow! We can ask her then.”

Crowley pauses. He looks at Aziraphale. “What.”

But Aziraphale’s already standing, talking as he moves through the shelves. “Yes, well, she seemed rather hysterical about… well, _you_ know, but she was quite determined to see you to a hospital nevertheless. When I assured her it wouldn’t be needed, she refused to leave unless I let her come back to visit.” Crowley can hear rummaging, books spilling. “Humans. They’re really quite fragile, you know, and so testy about it. I don’t see what the harm could be—she’ll come by, see you’re all right, then be on her merry way again.”

Aziraphale comes back. He has a wrap of white bandages in one hand and a little white box in the other. He shakes it at Crowley.

“A first-aid kit!” he says triumphantly. “I knew I had one.”

He sits back down by Crowley, setting his prizes on the table in front of them. 

“You can’t just let humans come to see me,” Crowley says. “Especially humans who watched you perform a miracle. She’s probably spreading stories to all her little human friends.”

“No, I don’t think so,” Aziraphale says. He’s not really paying attention to their conversation. His focus is on the knife. “She doesn’t feel like that kind of person to me.”

“Just because you can sense _love_ doesn’t mean you’re the best judge of—look, if you’re going to take it out, just take it out.”

“What?” Aziraphale looks up. “Oh. Oh! Yes, rather.”

He reaches out and curls a tentative hand around the hilt. Crowley’s holding his breath, even though it’s making fire race up and down his side, but Aziraphale only gets a mild wrinkle between his brow as he touches the knife, nothing more. Crowley releases the breath in a huge whoosh of air. He can feel the curve of Aziraphale’s knuckles against his stomach. 

“All right,” Aziraphale says. “I’ll pull it out on three. Ready?” He looks up and meets Crowley’s eyes directly. “One, two—”

He pulls. The pain intensifies into a white rush, so jagged and overwhelming that Crowley nearly blacks out. He wavers on the couch, trying to blink through the spots in his vision, panting. There’s a rush of blood in his ears, so it takes several moments before he realizes Aziraphale is babbling.

“—sorry, sorry, I’m so sorry, my dear. Hold on, I’m getting the bandages. Oh my, the blood—”

“Panicking,” Crowley rasps.

“I would say I am,” Aziraphale snaps at him. “Now hold still. Oh, Lord—”

Crowley breathes through his nose as evenly as he can as Aziraphale applies haphazard bandages to the knife wound. By the time he’s finished, Crowley doesn’t feel like he’s going to throw up anymore, at least.

“There,” Aziraphale says. “My, my. No wonder humans have to study so long to be a doctor. It’s rather more difficult than I expected, doing it the human way.”

Crowley glances down. His stomach seems to be covered in white bandages. He’s pretty sure there are way more than he actually needs, but he figures he’ll worry about it later. Tentatively, he stretches out. When that causes no more than a throb, he decides to try standing.

“What are you doing?”

“Going,” Crowley says. “I have to check my apartment. I didn’t get a chance before—”

Crowley pauses. He can feel his ears going red and he determinedly clears his throat. It was one thing, running straight to Aziraphale in the heat of the moment, scared out of his mind that he would arrive at another burned, empty bookstore. But it’s quite another to admit his own panic now that everything’s settled down again. He has an _image_ to maintain.

“You can’t possibly be serious,” Aziraphale says. He has smears of blood on his hands and wrists. “I did what I could, but you’re right! It’s not gone. Not to mention you might not be able to heal that stab wound on your own.”

“I feel better,” Crowley says. He’s thinking, a little nonsensically, of his plants. His apartment isn’t protected at all. Why didn’t he put any protections in place? He’s been sloppy. Sloppy and unprepared. “I have to check it.”

“Well, I’m coming with you, then,” Aziraphale says.

“Angel—”

“Half an hour ago, you were dying on my couch. Crowley, my dear, I hate to consider what you think of me if you seriously expect me to let you walk out of that door alone.”

They stare at each other. Aziraphale’s forehead is wrinkled, mouth pursed at its mutinous finest. There won’t be any persuading him. 

“Fine,” Crowley says. “You can come. But I’m driving.”

* * *

Crowley’s apartment door is ajar. 

He and Aziraphale pause in the hallway, exchanging looks. Crowley had battled for the right to walk on his own, shrugging off Aziraphale’s fluttering hands and worried exclamations. He does feel better and his vision is only going a little grey at the edges so he can walk by his damned self. He kind of regrets it now as the head rush of adrenaline makes him feel sick again and he has to lean against the wall or risk falling down. 

Aziraphale puts his hand on Crowley’s elbow. Crowley can feel the heat of it through the fabric of his shirt.

“I’ll go first, shall I?” he says in his mildest, nothing-but-a-human-bookseller voice.

Crowley’s not fooled by that voice. He hasn’t been for 6,000 years. Aziraphale might hem and haw and beam and prance around convincing everyone and their grandmother that he’s nothing but a beacon of light and goodness and purity, but Crowley’s not stupid. You don’t give the flaming sword to just _anyone_. And Crowley’s many, many things, but he hasn’t been a soldier in a long, long time. Not since he sauntered after Lucifer. Fighting isn’t something he _does_. 

But if there really are demons waiting for him in his apartment, the same kind of demons who didn’t hesitate to stab him with a knife coated in the worst kind of poison their kind knows, there’s no way Crowley’s just going to let Aziraphale waltz in there. 

“We’ll go together,” he says. He reaches out and hooks an arm over Aziraphale’s shoulder. “I’m feeling a mite bit woozy now. Better keep me upright.”

Aziraphale’s side look says he’s not fooled, but he doesn’t try to break Crowley’s hold. Grimly, they march toward the door together. Aziraphale reaches out and pushes the door open. Heart pumping hard against his ribcage, Crowley glances around the corner.

His heart drops sharply. Aziraphale lets out a harsh exhale against his ear. 

“Oh, Crowley,” he says. 

Crowley’s had this flat since 1902. It’s changed, obviously, updated with the times, but it’s been his place for nearly a century. It’s one of the longest times he’s spent living somewhere, actually. He’d collected things, small amusements—he sometimes goes to the flea market down the street and picks up the worst thing he can find just for fun. He has his soft blankets and strange symbolist paintings that mean nothing and his books. 

And his plants.

They’ve been smashed to bits, every single one. The shattered pots, carefully selected for each specific breed’s growth potential, are scattered across the floor, dirt and clay pieces and bits of greenery. Several of the hardier plants were torn, stems stripped bare of leaves and then bent. Two dozen of them, all picked by Crowley’s hand, monitored every day and watered rigorously, screamed at and scolded and subdued into beauty and they’re all _gone_.

Oh, he’s going to pass out.

“Easy there, my dear,” Aziraphale’s saying in his ear, his warm hands bracing against Crowley’s hip, but Crowley can barely hear him. 

His world has narrowed onto the carnage on the floor. His plants. His _plants_.

He isn’t aware of how little he’s holding himself up until Aziraphale tries to move him and his knees buckle, nearly bringing them both to the floor. 

“Crowley,” Aziraphale says. “Oh, dearest.”

Aziraphale’s hands burn from their place on Crowley’s shoulder and waist. Crowley shivers and tries to recover. 

“Sorry,” he says to the floor, carefully looking away from the plants. “I don’t—sorry.”

A long pause. Aziraphale carefully lifts his hands away. “It’s quite all right,” he says. “I’m dreadfully sorry, my dear. I know you love your plants.”

Crowley’s shoulders snap back. “I don’t _love_ them,” he sneers. His heart is fast and light against his chest, blood rushing in his ears. 

Aziraphale’s mouth purses. “Oh,” he says. “Of course not, how silly of me.”

“They’re—” Crowley catches a glimpse out of the corner of his eye again and swallows. He does feel quite sick. His vision is spinning, too. “They’re just plants, angel. Nothing to get all worked up over.”

“Hm,” Aziraphale says. “Well, no matter. We’d better get going.”

Crowley balks. “Get _going_? Going _where_?”

Aziraphale looks at him just as incredulously. “You can’t seriously expect to still stay here, can you? Crowley, they _broke into your flat_!” 

“They’re gone now,” he says. “They won’t be coming back.”

“And how are you so sure of that?”

“I just _know_ , all right?”

“Crowley—”

“Because they know they’ve killed me!” Crowley says, throwing his hands up and immediately regretting it. The world’s spinning again. He groans catching himself before he hits the floor. Aziraphale’s there again immediately, bracing Crowley against his shoulder. Crowley waits for the dizziness to subside before he speaks again, more quietly. “They wanted to get rid of me and now they have, angel. No reason to come back. Even this was just…” He shrugs. “Insult to injury.”

Aziraphale’s shoulder goes tense. “You’re not _dying_ , Crowley,” he says. “Haven’t we already been over this?”

“Dunno how you expect to stop it, that’s all,” Crowley says. “Holy water isn’t—”

“Something you stop, you’ve said. Never mind how, I _will_. Which means you have to stay alive and out of trouble until I do. Do you seriously want to stay here? Even if you think they’re done with you, if they hear you survived again, they could be back.”

Crowley shakes his head. “I don’t…” He swallows.

Aziraphale places a careful finger under his chin and tilts his head. Their eyes meet. Aziraphale looks paler than usual, exhausted. Crowley’s chest tightens. 

“What, my dear?” he asks.

Crowley swallows again. “I don’t think I can go anywhere else.” 

Aziraphale’s eyes darken. “Oh,” he says. “You feel—?”

“Weaker, yeah,” Crowley admits. “Everything’s spinning.”

Aziraphale contemplates him. He’s usually an open one, Crowley’s angel, but right now Crowley has no idea what thoughts are spinning in that head. It’s disconcerting, not being able to read Aziraphale. Crowley’s made it into something of an art form after all these years. Finally, Aziraphale sighs. He stands and before Crowley has a moment to mourn the loss of his hands, he’s being tugged upright too, tucked firmly into Aziraphale’s side before his legs have a chance to collapse from under him again.

“Come on, then,” Aziraphale says. “Time for bed, I think.”

“The mess—”

“You leave that to me. Sleep’s a miracle cure, or so the humans seem to think. And I know you’re as addicted to it as you are to anything. Maybe it’ll help.”

They enter Crowley’s bedroom. Crowley flushes a little. He’d thought about having Aziraphale there more than once, entertained what might finally bring it about in several fantasies. But he’d never thought it’d be anything like this—him as weak as a newborn and Aziraphale looking around with wide, curious eyes, taking in his king bed and rumpled sheets and darkened windows with undisguised interest. 

“Not quite what I imagined,” Aziraphale says.

Crowley grins. “You think about my bedroom often, angel?” he asks.

He wants it to come out a little sultry, but his voice is so weak it falls flat. Damn it. Aziraphale still goes a satisfying pink color and hastily frog-marches Crowley to his bed. 

“Of course not,” he blusters as he settles Crowley onto the mattress. “But you do go on about the wonders of sleep, so I just happened to _wonder_ what… I mean, it was something I had some natural curiosity over… Oh, bother.” He makes a face at Crowley. “Stop looking so smug.”

“Smug? Me?” Crowley makes a woeful face. “You’d accuse your dying friend of such a thing, angel?”

Aziraphale’s good-humored fluster leaves immediately. Crowley curses inwardly.

“Don’t joke about that,” he says in a much harder voice. “I can’t bear that, Crowley.”

Crowley wants to close his eyes and sleep another century away. He nods. “I won’t,” he says. 

“Lie down.”

Crowley wants to make a joke about taking orders in bed, but he has a feeling the atmosphere for joking has disappeared. He lies back. He’s still in his clothes. He wonders if Aziraphale knows you’re supposed to wear pajamas to bed or if he ever guessed that Crowley often went to sleep wearing nothing at all. 

Aziraphale frowns down at him and then snaps his fingers. There’s a brief pulse of his heavenly light and Crowley’s clothes have transformed into something softer and less confining. They smell faintly of lilac. The bed, too, smells of green things; the sheets have been cleaned and, for some reason, they feel softer. Crowley closes his eyes. Lying down, the pain isn’t as bad.

A hand smooths over his forehead, trailing into his hair. Crowley smiles.

“Go to sleep, my dear,” Aziraphale says and Crowley does as he’s told.

* * *

Crowley wakes to sunlight.

He blinks, bleary and confused. There shouldn’t be sunlight in his bedroom, he thinks, still half-asleep and irritable. He’s had the darkening curtains forever and besides, the room knows to keep itself dark. He’s slept for days without a hint of light. Where is the blasted—

Singing. He hears singing. 

Crowley’s scowl softens. That’s Aziraphale, all right, off-key and unabashed, singing something that was probably created before humanity. Crowley’s tried to key him into human music, but Aziraphale’s musical tastes remain steadfastly angelic. (Excepting, of course, jazz which Aziraphale maintains is as close as humans have come to imitating angelic hymns.) 

Crowley closes his eyes, listening. He forgot. That’s the dangerous thing about sleep, he thinks, the thing humans take for granted. It’s so easy to forget things when you’ve slept, so easy to get one, two, even three blissful moments where your troubles and pains are put away in a box and won’t bother you. Angels and demons don’t really get to do that, awake all the time. Ever watchful.

He opens his eyes and sighs. Aziraphale will probably want to go somewhere for breakfast, he thinks. Maybe he actually can, he doesn’t feel all that bad considering he got stabbed yesterday— 

Crowley tries to sit up. He immediately leans over the side of the bed and vomits on the floor. 

He gasps and heaves. There isn’t anything in his stomach except bile and, apparently, blood; the smell makes Crowley’s tender stomach roil and he has to heave again, shuddering through it. His head pounds, pain pinpointing behind his right eye. He can’t hold his body up.

Warm hands push him back on the bed. Aziraphale looks down at him, eyebrows crinkled and mouth pursed. He has some kind of apron on, but it’s not a cooking apron. It’s covered in dirt. 

“Oh, dear,” Aziraphale says and presses his hand to Crowley’s forehead. Crowley closes his eyes. Aziraphale’s hands are usually warmer than a human’s, especially to Crowley, but right now they feel practically icy.

“‘S nice,” he mutters, all sibilant constants. 

“Crowley? Crowley, look at me.” Crowley doesn’t want to open his eyes. “Anthony.”

Warmth floods Crowley’s entire body. He opens his eyes. Aziraphale’s never called him that before, the human name Crowley chose in a fit of pique and rebellion. His own middle finger to the God who gave him the name he’d been forced to relinquish and Satan who had re-named him Crawley and given the reputation he hated. Crowley had hated their names, the brand they implied. He cast off Crawley early but being even just Crowley rankled. He’d wanted… he’d wanted to take a name like the humans he’d lived amongst for so long. To slide a little more into their ranks, to feel a little more like them.

Aziraphale’s never commented on Crowley’s human name since the last big war when Crowley saved him from those spies. Never used it, not once. 

“What?” Crowley asks.

Aziraphale’s smile is soft. “How do you feel?”

“Pretty sure my guts on the floor answer that question,” Crowley says, aiming for wry but landing on bitter. 

Aziraphale’s smile tightens. “Yes, I can see that you haven’t yet recovered.”

“Angel, it’s only going to get worse. There’s no _recovery_ from this.”

Aziraphale’s face spasms. Crowley watches with fascination, but the little flicker is gone almost as soon as it appears, leaving only the serenity behind. 

“Yes, well, I think I can do something about that,” Aziraphale says. “While you’ve been asleep, I collected as many books as I could. There has to be an answer _somewhere_.” 

“An _answer_? Angel—”

“But enough of that! Let me get this mess cleaned up and then let’s see if you feel well enough to come out into the living room. I have a surprise for you.”

Aziraphale snaps his fingers to vanish the mess on the floor. There’s the faint smell of lilacs again and Crowley relaxes a little. Aziraphale leans down and takes Crowley’s shoulders, helping him sit up slowly and carefully. Crowley’s head spins, pain sharpening behind his eye again, and his stomach rolls, but he doesn’t throw up again. Aziraphale sits with him, hands still in place, until Crowley’s body calms down.

“Surprise?” he asks once he’s recovered a little. 

Aziraphale beams at him. “I think you’ll love it! Come on.”

Aziraphale is infinitely patient as he leads Crowley out into the living room—a journey that took all of two minutes yesterday and takes, instead, at least twenty today. Crowley’s frustration with his own frail body increases with every faltering step—even just being upright is enough to make him dizzy and nauseous. It’s not _right_. Even when he’d first turned into a human, he was never so weak. 

Aziraphale never falters. He keeps his hand on Crowley’s elbow and waist the entire trek. Even at his dizziest, Crowley can’t ignore the sensation of Aziraphale’s fingers on him.

“Come on, almost there,” Aziraphale urges him as they turn the corner. 

“What…” Crowley has to pant. Fuck. “What is this… surprise?”

“You’ll see! Come on.”

Why had Crowley made this place so damn big anyway? He’s never had anyone over before, not even Aziraphale until after the Apocalypse. 

They come into the living room. Crowley’s kind of expecting something garish and well-intentioned - maybe a giant stuffed animal or a sea of balloons or something - but stops dead when he realizes the corner that has always held his plants, which should be entirely empty after yesterday’s carnage, is instead blooming with color. 

“I thought you’d like to have some replacements,” Aziraphale says into Crowley’s ear. “I don’t know as much about plants as you, my dear, but I popped round to some of the best florist shops in the area and made a go at picking some up. They’re all excellent ones, I’ve been assured.”

Crowley can’t stop looking at them. Aziraphale got him plants, he thinks faintly. Not just any plants, but beautiful ones with frothing green leaves and full-budded flowers that make the entire room smell green and vibrant. Slowly, Crowley sinks down into a chair at the dining table. 

“Oh, dear,” Aziraphale says. “Should I not have done it? I can still bring them back, I suppose—”

“No!” 

Crowley looks up to catch Aziraphale’s surprise melting into something amused and—Crowley begins to flush and he looks away, back toward the plants. He clears his throat and forces his voice to remain even and calm.

“No,” he says, trying to project carelessness. “There’s no need for that, not when they’re already here. Might as well keep them.”

“Oh, of course,” Aziraphale says and brushes his fingers over Crowley’s shoulder in a light touch that sends goosebumps all down Crowley’s arm. “Might as well.”

Crowley refuses to acknowledge the good-natured humor in Aziraphale’s voice. He straightens his back and ignores how it makes his vision go black at the edges.

“Shouldn’t you be getting back to the shop?”

There’s a long pause. Crowley frowns hard at the flowers, but when Aziraphale continues to be silent, he finally turns to look. He isn’t expecting Aziraphale to be staring at him, full of incredulous outrage. 

“What?” he snaps. “I know you don’t like to leave it for long, so—”

“I am not going back to the shop,” Aziraphale says, each word pointed and forceful, “until you are no longer suffering a slow and painful death from holy water poisoning.”

Crowley frowns at him. “What do you mean?” he asks, nonplussed. 

“What do you _mean_ what do I mean? Obviously, I’m going to stay here with you!”

“What? No, no, no, you can’t—”

“Of course I’m staying! You couldn’t even get out of bed by yourself, Crowley!”

Crowley bristles. “I could have if I’d really wanted to!”

Aziraphale scowls at him. “Don’t bluster, not with me,” he says. “Your body, it’s not healing itself, it’s not recovering. It’s _disintegrating_ from the inside out. As you said, I put a stop-gap on the process yesterday, but it’s a band-aid on a bullet wound and you know that as well as I do.”

“Then there’s nothing you can do for me anyway,” Crowley says. “There’s no point in you staying around. Go back to the bookshop.”

“If you think I can go back knowing that you’ll be back here, helpless and alone in an apartment that’s already been ransacked by bloodthirsty demons—”

“I don’t want you to watch me die, angel!”

Aziraphale’s face cracks at Crowley’s shout. His eyes are huge and blue in his wan face. He sits down next to Crowley at the table and takes Crowley’s hand. He really does have such nice, soft palms, Crowley thinks, trying to make his racing heart slow down. He doesn’t like arguing with Aziraphale, not the real kind of arguing, anyway. It always makes him jumpy. 

“Yesterday, I was worried something might happen if I didn’t warn you,” Crowley says, looking at their intertwined hands instead of Aziraphale’s face. “I didn’t think. But I don’t—I don’t want you to have to stand around and watch as I waste away, angel.”

“Oh, Crowley,” Aziraphale says, tightening his grip on Crowley’s hand. “Didn’t I already tell you that you aren’t allowed to die?”

Crowley snorts, relaxing a little. “I don’t think you’ve got any say in the matter.”

“I think you’ll find I do,” Aziraphale says. He releases Crowley’s hand and brings a finger under Crowley’s chin, tilting his head up. Their eyes meet. Aziraphale’s face is still soft and vulnerable with sadness. “And even if I can’t stop it, do you really think I could be anywhere else right now?”

Crowley swallows around the lump in his throat. “I’ve never had a roommate before,” he says, quietly giving in. 

Aziraphale smiles at him. “I’m sure we’ll figure it out together, my dear.” 

* * *

Aziraphale’s not sure what time it is when there’s a knock on Crowley’s front door. He tenses. Crowley, bundled up in blankets on the sofa, doesn’t even twitch and that almost worries Aziraphale as much as his wheezing breaths and wan complexion. Crowley’s always pretended to be easy-going and approachable, but he’s really quite paranoid. He usually reacts to potential threats much more quickly than Aziraphale. 

Aziraphale closes his book, stretching out his senses. They’re slower than usual - he’s been pouring most of his considerable focus and energy into research over the past 24 hours and it’s beginning to show. He really is getting old. Only a century ago, this kind of binge would have barely registered to him.

He relaxes when he realizes there’s no demonic presence on the other side of the door. Not angelic, either - totally human. He glances again at Crowley, who’s been asleep since Aziraphale tried to feed him some toast that afternoon and then spent an hour with him in the bathroom as he sicked it up in a newly conjured toliet. He really does look pale, Aziraphale thinks. And his sickness… Aziraphale’s never seen Crowley like this, shaking and nauseous and weak. 

Another knock. Persistent. 

Aziraphale opens the door. A human stares up at him. She looks vaguely familiar - something about the hair and her bright sneakers. He frowns at her.

“Pardon me,” he says. “Do I know you?”

She stares at him. “You can’t be that old,” she says. 

He blinks. “Excuse me?”

“Oh come _on_. We met _yesterday_! How many people are bringing stabbed guys into your shop, that you don’t remember me?”

“Oh!” Aziraphale says. Right, the human who helped Crowley. Who had seen—well. The aftermath. He’d quite forgotten that he’d invited her to come back and visit. He glances back at the sleeping Crowley. “Well, it’s good to see you again, dear, but we aren’t really entertaining visitors at the moment.”

He closes the door, or tries to. She sticks her heavy combat boot between it and the wall, quite disrupting the process. Aziraphale frowns and opens it back up again to face her scowl.

“Look,” she says. “I let you rush me off yesterday because, frankly, I was freaking the fuck out about what was going on, but I didn’t drive in that crazy car with that sunglasses guy just to get the run-around _now_ , so either you let me in now or I go and find a goddamn cop.” She grimaces even as she says it. “Please don’t make me do that.”

Aziraphale sighs. He looks her up and down. “You’ll have to be quiet,” he says finally. “He’s sleeping.”

She relaxes and follows him inside without another word. Aziraphale watches as she takes in the apartment with slowly raising eyebrows, but her face softens a little when she catches sight of Crowley on the couch. Aziraphale loves her for that immediately and decides that he made the right choice, telling her she could visit. Though… His forehead wrinkles.

“Miss… Oh, dear,” he says. “I’m sorry, I never got your name.”

“Miriam,” the girl says. Her face wrinkles with disgust. “But, God, don’t call me that. Most people call me Mimi.”

Aziraphale smiles. The human world is so full of strange coincidences, he thinks. Crowley had quite liked the original Miriam, Moses’ sister. Aziraphale remembers that he’d thought she had more ferocity in her little finger than most people had in their entire body. 

“Mimi,” he says. “How did you find this place? I told you to come back to the bookshop.”

She blinks. “Oh, I did! That’s why I’m here so late. No one was there when I went, but there was this lady outside who gave me directions. She said you should be here.”

Aziraphale tenses. “A lady?” he asks. There’s only a handful of people who know where Crowley’s apartment is and even less who should know that Aziraphale and Crowley are there. “What did she look like?”

Mimi opens her mouth to answer and pauses. Her brow wrinkles. She’s silent for several long moments, clearly struggling.

“I don’t know,” she says finally, clearly bemused by it. “She was… a woman, I guess? I think she was younger than my mom. I can’t remember her face.”

That really does set alarm bells ringing, but Crowley makes a sound on the couch and draws their attention before Aziraphale can ask her more about it. He tucks the question away as he steps over to the couch and puts his hand on Crowley’s shoulder. He feels warm, even through his clothes, warmer than Crowley should. 

“And how are you feeling, my dear?” he asks.

“Like I ate gravel,” Crowley says. His voice is low and rough. 

Aziraphale smiles down at him. He’s never really seen Crowley like this, pliant and groggy from fresh sleep. If the circumstances themselves weren’t so worrying, Aziraphale might actually enjoy being around Crowley with his formidable defenses lowered. 

A cough from behind him. Crowley tenses and immediately whips out his hand and grabs the sunglasses that are resting on the table nearby, throwing them on with so much haste they end up crooked. Aziraphale straightens them for him.

“You might remember Miss Miriam,” he says. Another, more pointed cough. “Who prefers to be called Mimi.”

Crowley peers over the couch and groans. “Oh, it’s _you_ ,” he says.

“Well,” Mimi says, coming closer. She’s examining Crowley critically, Aziraphale notices, her mouth pursed. “At least _you_ remember me.” She gives Aziraphale a side-long look. “And he was stabbed for most of the time I was around.”

Aziraphale huffs. It’s hardly _his_ fault that humans are so similar, is it? Crowley smirks at him, looking so like his old self that Aziraphale’s annoyance melts away almost immediately. 

“Shall we have some tea?” he asks. “I’m sure Mimi here is anxious to assure herself of your well-being, Crowley.”

“Oh, angel—”

“Be right back!” 

Aziraphale hurries into the neat little kitchen, humming under his breath.

* * *

“He’s a little bossy, that guy,” the human, Miriam, observes. She turns back to Crowley and sits down on the sofa next to him, examining him critically. “Huh. Looking good, guy.”

Crowley snorts. “Lie,” he says.

“No, no. For someone who was all stabbed yesterday, you seem suspiciously fine.” She pokes his arm. “Are you _sure_ you got stabbed?”

“Pretty sure, yeah. Hard to miss, that.” He eyes her. “Any reason you decided to come back?”

She rolls her eyes. “What kind of life do you _lead_ , dude?” she demands. “Because in mine, which was pretty normal until yesterday, when you see some guy get stabbed and then drive in his crazy car and get healed by his boyfriend with the _magic power of his touch_ , you kind of don’t just walk away and pretend it never happened!”

“He didn’t _heal_ me,” Crowley says. 

“That is _not_ the most important part of—Wait, what? Really? But he did all that—” She mimes holding her own face with such tenderness that Crowley actually flushes. “Or was that just foreplay for you two?”

Crowley sputters, flush deepening. “We don’t—We aren’t—”

“Wait, shit, really? Because the way you were were looking at each other, I thought—”

“Tea time!”

Crowley practically collapses in relief as Aziraphale re-appears, though he shakes his head frantically as Aziraphale looks between them and opens his mouth, obviously ready to ask about what’s going on. Aziraphale’s eyebrows go up, but he stays blessedly quiet, setting down the tea tray that has definitely never existed in Crowley’s kitchen until this moment on the low coffee table. 

“Well, Mimi,” Aziraphale says. “Tell us about yourself! What do you do here in London?”

Miriam spears Crowley with a look of utter disbelief—it says _is this guy seriously making small talk right now?_ with just her eyebrows, very impressive—and Crowley shrugs, smiling a little. She rolls her eyes with obvious disgust.

“I’m in psychology,” she says. “I’m doing my Master’s, I’m 24, I’m an orphan, and I want you to tell me what actually happened yesterday and why _he_ —” She stabs an accusing finger at Crowley, who waggles his in a wave. “—is not at the hospital recovering from a wound that every medical site I checked yesterday agreed could easily kill him.”

“Ah,” Aziraphale says, looking at Crowley uneasily. “Well, uh—”

“You should tell her,” Crowley says to him.

Aziraphale frowns at him. “It’s against the rules,” he says.

“When have we ever cared about that, angel? She’s just going to keep poking her nose in things until she figures it out anyway. Might as well tell her. Not like she’ll believe it anyway.”

“Don’t talk about me like I’m not here,” Miriam says. “Tell me _what_?”

Aziraphale aims a cross look at Crowley but turns back to Miriam with a gentle smile. “What do you know about angels and demons, Mimi?”

* * *

To her credit, the young woman listens intently to Aziraphale’s explanation. Her face makes several interesting expressions, particularly as he describes the events of the last few months, but she keeps all her comments to herself until Aziraphale finally comes to the end. When he’s done talking, his throat a little raspy, she stands and makes several feverish circles of the room. Aziraphale glances at Crowley, who had gone drowsy and quiet during Aziraphale’s tale, but Crowley just shrugs. 

“So you’re telling me that you,” she gestures to Aziraphale, “are actually an angel of God, who is apparently very real, and he,” she gestures to Crowley, “is a demon of Satan, also real, and that the whole mess yesterday was a consequence of an Apocalypse that we only avoided because of an eleven-year-old boy’s stubbornness?”

“Sums it up,” Crowley says agreeably. 

“Quite.”

“This is insane,” she says. She comes to a stop in front of Crowley. “But it’s so insane that I honestly just believe you.”

“Well you should,” Aziraphale tells her. “We’re telling you the truth.”

She ignores him. “So you’ve been _poisoned_ ,” she says. “Holy water really works on demons?”

“Oh, yes,” Crowley says. “Rather effective, really. I should know.”

“Then why didn’t you die right away?”

Still a good question, Aziraphale says. He’s wondered that much himself.

“Dunno,” Crowley says. “Almost did, really. Aziraphale stopped it.”

They both look at him. Aziraphale shakes his head. “I tried to take it from you,” he admits. “But it didn’t work. It just weakened it a little, I think, made it less toxic. I gave you more time.”

“More time to die,” Crowley agrees.

Aziraphale flinches and Mimi lands a light punch to Crowley’s shoulder. He yelps and scowls at her, rubbing his arm.

“Don’t say that!” she says fiercely. “You said you’re trying to find a way to help him, right?” she asks Aziraphale. 

“Yes,” Aziraphale says, still unhappy at the sheer thought of his actions merely making Crowley’s death into something long and painful. “Yes, of course.”

“Then have a little faith, dude!” she tells Crowley. “He’s your boyfriend, isn’t he? He’s gonna save you.”

Crowley stares at her. “If anyone can do it, it’s Aziraphale,” he says. 

Aziraphale flushes. Oh, he thinks, filled with deep and private pride. Mimi makes a face.

“Okay, that’s just grossly soppy,” she says. “But it’s also the spirit, so it’s fine. Because I’ll tell you right now, if you just give up you’re definitely not going to make it, okay? Belief takes you past any kind of medicine.” 

“You really believe that,” Crowley says, sounding surprised.

“I really believe that if you give yourself up as dead, you’re going to die quicker,” she tells him. “Don’t you believe in your boyfriend?”

“Yeah,” Crowley says. “Of course.”

“Then you’re going to be fine. Believe that.”

He smiles at her a little. “You’re taking this pretty well for a human.”

“Oh I am going to _freak_ the fuck out when I leave,” she tells him frankly. “But I am a master of compartmentalization. Now, I do have some serious questions I expect you to answer.”

“Oh?” Aziraphale asks, a little nervous. “What are those?”

She sits down next to Crowley and turns to Aziraphale intently. “I need to know… is Freddie Mercury in heaven?”

Crowley laughs next to her and Aziraphale relaxes a little. For the rest of her visit, they only take turns defending why different celebrities ended up in Heaven or Hell.

* * *

Aziraphale has often found that time moves strangely when he gets focused on his research, so it’s not really a surprise when he sits down with his books after Crowley’s fallen into an uneasy sleep and looks up to find that it’s morning already. He rubs at his eye and contemplates the latest book, a treatise on demonic biology that’s been banned from Heaven for at least three centuries. It had been difficult to find and even more difficult to pry from its owner. Aziraphale’s not sure it was worth the effort now - the book is full of as many inaccuracies as it is truth and none of it has been helpful in revealing how he might cure Crowley.

Nothing has been, really. All the writings agree that holy water, blessed by God, purges demonic energy and works as an ultimate weapon against all of Satan’s creatures. As far as Aziraphale’s been able to tell, no one’s ever tried using it as a slow-working poison before so all Aziraphale can do is speculate about why Crowley hasn’t died outright already. He can’t even begin to figure out how to get the poison out of his system or how to keep it from killing him slowly.

Aziraphale makes a low frustrated sound. A headache is springing up behind his left eye. He rubs slowly at his forehead and takes deep breaths. It will be fine, he assures himself. He will uncover something, some hidden clue that will make everything better and help him cure Crowley. They have time. After all, hadn’t Crowley been just fine yesterday, sitting up and talking with their new human friend? He’d even been able to eat some soup last night before sleeping again. Aziraphale has time.

He nods to himself and gets up. It’s probably time to wake Crowley - at the very least, he’ll need some more food. They’ve both found they need to actually eat more now that they’ve been cut off from their offices and Aziraphale’s sure that goes double for Crowley now that he’s injured. 

He pauses at the threshold of Crowley’s bedroom, taken off-guard, as he has been since the moment he first saw it, by the opulent spread of Crowley’s bed. He’s imagined, more than once, what it might look like in this forbidden place, but in all of his guilty fantasies, he never quite conjured up anything close to the real thing. Crowley isn’t really hedonistic - the rest of his apartment is quite sparse, very simple - but it’s clear that he values his precious sleep. His bed is wide, deep, and looks so utterly comfortable that Aziraphale’s been tempted more than once to join Crowley for a doze. 

A soft noise catches Aziraphale’s attention and he frowns as he realizes Crowley, who he has begun to think of as a relatively still sleeper, is twitching and tossing. He’s thrown off the heavy blankets on the bed and his skin… Aziraphale’s frown deepens and he moves closer to the bed. He places a tentative hand on Crowley’s forehead and hisses, deeply disturbed. Crowley’s skin is covered in a thin sheen of sweat and it is so hot that just touching it is enough to warm Aziraphale’s palm. Something’s wrong, deeply wrong.

“Dearest?” Aziraphale says and puts a gentle hand on Crowley’s shoulder, trying to wake him. “Crowley?”

His worry deepens as Crowley doesn’t respond to the gentle shaking or Aziraphale’s voice. Crowley’s not a _light_ sleeper, but he’s never taken so long to be pulled out of slumber. Something is wrong, wrong, _wrong_ — 

“Anthony?” he tries. 

The sound of Crowley’s human name is as strange and sweetly taboo as it had been the first time Aziraphale had said it, but Crowley doesn’t respond. And if he were awake, he _would_ respond - probably just as he had yesterday, with widened eyes and a rising flush and an embarrassment that was so deep it almost seemed like pleasure… 

Aziraphale takes several deep, careful breaths. He runs a hand over Crowley’s sweaty forehead, through his thick hair. He’s burning up. He’s not waking up. His eyes are moving behind the thin skin of his eyelids, too fast to be healthy. Aziraphale knows very little about how human bodies respond to illnesses, but even he knows this isn’t a good sign. Crowley’s getting _worse_ and he’s getting worse worriedly quickly.

Aziraphale may not have time after all.

“Come on, dearest,” he murmurs. 

Carefully, he reaches under Crowly’s back and lifts him. It’s worryingly easy. Crowley’s never been what anyone might call bulky, but surely he shouldn’t be this light? Aziraphale tries to remember back to the times Crowley’s leaned on his shoulder and finds his mind coming up blank. _Has_ Crowley ever leaned on his shoulder? Aziraphale frowns, but Crowley tosses his head and his attention is diverted.

“Up we go,” he says. Crowley’s eyes flutter. “That’s it, come on. Time to wake up.”

He props Crowley up against the headboard as his eyes finally open. It’s almost worse when they do - the bright, clear yellow has become cloudy and unfocused. He’s awake, but he’s not present. 

“Crowley?” Aziraphale tries again, reaching out to touch his forehead again. Just as hot. Damn. 

Crowley leans into his touch like a kitten. That’s strange enough to make Aziraphale jump a little. 

Crowley’s not _shy_ , but he has his own very obvious boundary of personal space. Admittedly, it’s gotten smaller and smaller over the long time they’ve known each other, but Aziraphale’s always respected it. Crowley’s never been one to reach out for a touch, not once. Aziraphale’s gotten away with a lot of it since Crowley’s attack, more than he probably should have, but Crowley’s still never _welcomed_ it like this— 

Aziraphale pulls away. Crowley makes a low, displeased sound, a hiss. 

“We’re running out of time,” Aziraphale tells him. He ignores the frantic beat of his own heart. He can’t afford to fall apart right now. “We need help.”

There are not many people who _can_ help them. In fact, there’s only about one who might have a chance at it, for all that she’s human. Aziraphale considers Crowley, biting his lip. The real question, he acknowledges, is if it’s safe at all for Crowley to move right now. Surely it’d be better for him to stay in bed? Perhaps he can go and bring her back here and—

A soft touch to Aziraphale’s hand. He looks down and realizes Crowley is touching him, the barest brush of his fingertips against the hand Aziraphale has braced on the bed. As Aziraphale looks, Crowley’s fingers curl hesitantly around Aziraphale’s pinky. Aziraphale’s heart constricts. Carefully, he covers Crowley’s hand with his own. Even Crowley’s fingers are too hot. 

“Come on,” he says. “We’re going to Tadfield.”

* * *

Crowley comes back to himself a little as Aziraphale bundles him in a coat. He blinks at Aziraphale, bleary and far too pale.

“What?” he asks. He looks around. “We’re leaving?”

His voice is rusty, exhausted. Aziraphale begins to button his coat for him, right up to the throat. 

“You have a fever,” he says and thanks the Lord that his voice is steadier than his heart. “Anathema is a witch and she’s Agnes’ successor. She might have an answer I haven’t seen yet or some way to ease your suffering as I search.”

Crowley makes a face. “ _Tadfield_?” he asks.

“It’s a perfectly lovely little town,” Aziraphale says. “And we need all the help we can get or—” 

He can’t finish that thought. Crowley needs a hat and his sunglasses. Aziraphale hurries to find them both, trying to get his own wild emotions under control. Crowley’s weak, sick, vulnerable as a human baby. Aziraphale needs to be steady as a rock right now. If he crumples, who will help Crowley?

He’s got it back under control by the time he returns with Crowley’s sunglasses and hat in tow. He tugs the hat over Crowley’s hair and holds out the sunglasses to him. Crowley blinks at them like he’s never seen them before and Aziraphale’s stomach practically knots in worry. 

He attempts a smile. “I’ve got it, dear,” he says.

He unfolds the vulnerable temples. For a moment, he keeps them in his palm, considering the weight of the glasses that have defined Crowley for most of the time that Aziraphale has known him. They’re surprisingly light, strangely delicate. A piece of Crowley’s armor. 

He looks back at Crowley’s face. His unfocused, exhausted, utterly demonic eyes. With infinite care, Aziraphale lifts the glasses to Crowley’s face and slides them, inch by careful inch, over his nose to settle in their proper place over his eyes. 

“Come on then,” Aziraphale says. “We’d better get going if we want to make it there before nightfall.”

He begins to lead Crowley to the door. Crowley balks, though he’s weak enough that it’s just a tug against Aziraphale’s arm. Aziraphale stops, frowning at him.

“I don’t…” Crowley frowns. “I can’t drive like this,” he says and it sounds like the confession hurts to come out of him.

_Oh._ Aziraphale hadn’t even thought about it. Crowley’s been driving him around for as long as there have been cars - he hadn’t even stopped to _consider_ — Oh, he is a silly angel. He chews on the inside of his mouth. Tadfield is just a normal little town again—they _could_ just get there by, well, _supernatural_ means if they wanted. But he’s not sure Crowley can handle that either, in his state, and he’s certainly not leaving Crowley behind and, besides, it’s always a dicey game playing with the laws of physics like that.

“There’s no help for it, then,” Aziraphale says. “I’ll have to drive.”

Crowley tenses. “You?” he asks. “But you don’t even know _how_ to drive.”

“How hard can it be?” Aziraphale asks. “Besides, I’m sure the Bentley will help me out if I get stuck.”

“Angel—”

“Crowley, Anathema is a witch of some power and her ancestor was Agnes Nutter. She’s the most likely person on Earth who can help us right now. We need to go to Tadfield.”

Crowley shifts. “I don’t…” He shifts again. “You’ll be careful?”

“Probably more careful than you are,” Aziraphale tells him, but Crowley doesn’t even smirk. He still looks anxious and a little lost and, most of all, sick. Aziraphale softens. “I will be very careful with her, my dear. I know how much you love that car.”

“Not love,” Crowley tells him. “Demon.”

“Of course,” Aziraphale agrees, though he mentally rolls his eyes. “Shall we be off, then?”

He thinks Crowley will balk again. But it only takes another moment of hesitant thought before Crowley sighs.

“Well,” he says. “If it had to be someone, at least it’s you.”

It’s not a very polite compliment, but Aziraphale’s beyond pleased anyway.

* * *

The Bentley doesn’t start at first when Aziraphale slides behind the driver’s seat. Crowley, in the seat next to him and looking a little uncomfortable with it, rolls his eyes.

“Drama queen,” he mutters and pats the dashboard sharply. “It’s _Aziraphale_.”

Another long moment of silence and then the engine turns over and the car starts up. Aziraphale puts his hands on the steering wheel, startled to find it already warm to the touch, and cautiously pulls out. But driving is not at all difficult - the car seems to know exactly what Aziraphale wants to do and helps him get out of London without any major accidents or even traffic.

Anathema’s little cottage is quiet as Aziraphale pulls into the driveway. The Bentley hums a little louder as they park—almost a purr—then goes silent as it turns itself off. Crowley stirs in the passenger seat. Aziraphale looks over to find him yawning, mouth opening wider than a normal human's should be able to. He runs a hand through his hair, straightening the cowlicks and shakes himself, clearly trying to wake up. The sleep seems to have helped—he doesn’t look as dazed by his fever as he had when they left London. 

Aziraphale smiles at him. He places a gentle hand on Crowley’s elbow and ignores the unnatural heat of his skin—he takes comfort, instead, in the solidity of Crowley’s arm. Crowley is here, he thinks. He is alive and he is okay. 

For now, anyway.

“Did you have a nice nap, my dear?”

Crowley sighs. “Nice enough,” he says. “This is it, isn’t it?”

“Yes. Are you ready?”

“Ready?” Crowley snorts and scrubs a hand through his hair again. “To let that little human do—what _is_ it you’re hoping she’ll do, anyhow?”

“Find something I’ve missed,” Aziraphale says. He tightens his grip on Crowley’s elbow. “Help you feel better.”

Crowley shakes his head. “You know that human saying, angel? If wishes were horses…”

“I’m sure I could give you half a dozen human sayings about the good optimism does a person.”

“I’m a demon. I’m not built for optimism.”

“You seemed to forget that little fact during the Apocalypse.”

Crowley scowls at him. “She’s going to wonder why we haven’t come in yet.”

Victory. Aziraphale doesn’t let his smugness show as he opens the driver’s side door. Crowley will never admit to losing an argument, of course, but Aziraphale’s learned to take his victories where he can when he’s dealing with someone so hard-headed.

As if to prove Aziraphale’s assessment, Crowley’s already trying to stand as he rounds the car. Aziraphale sighs and hurries to catch him before he falls flat on his face.

“Let me help you,” he says. “You’re weak as a kitten, you’re in no condition to walk by yourself—”

“I’m not an _invalid_ ,” Crowley snaps. 

“You’ve got a fever that would probably kill a human,” Aziraphale tells him. “You’ve hardly eaten anything in the last two days and, oh yes, you were _poisoned by holy water_.”

“ _What_?”

They both look up to see Anathema in front of them, her face stricken and horrified. Behind her, Newt stands in the doorway, wringing his hands, a worried furrow between his eyebrows. 

“Oh, bother,” Aziraphale says. He’d meant to break the news more gently. He tries to take a step but Crowley’s knees buckle and they both nearly go down. “I’m so sorry, but can you help me with him?”

“Angel—”

“Help… Oh! Oh, of course, let me—”

Anathema is taller than Aziraphale and about even with Crowley, which helps balance things out a little. They still stagger to the cottage door. Crowley’s panting as they finally make it inside, his face white and sweaty. 

“Come on,” Anathema says. “The couch is as good as anywhere.”

Crowley collapses the moment they deposit him. Aziraphale catches his breath and runs a quick hand over Crowley’s hair, soothing him as best he can. Crowley makes a face at him, but he’s recovering some of the color to his face now that he’s no longer moving.

“Tell me everything,” Anathema says. 

“What on Earth’s going on?” Newt asks. “You’re that—that angel and demon fellow from the end of the world, aren’t you? Shadwell’s employers?”

Aziraphale nods at him distractedly. He doesn’t have much time to catch the lad up, unfortunately. 

“Yes, that’s us,” he says. “Miss, we happen to require the services of a witch.”

Anathema’s brow wrinkles. “You’re an angel.” She folds her arms over her chest. “Anything I can do, I’m sure you could do and better. Why do you need me?”

“Two days ago, Crowley was stabbed by a knife that was coated in holy water,” Aziraphale says. Newt gasps but Anathema’s eyes just narrow in consideration. “I managed to pause the process, but he will die if I can’t find some way to take the poison out of his system.”

Anathema looks between them. “He’s a demon.”

“We’re up to date on that,” Crowley says. His voice is still high and thin, but he isn’t panting anymore. “Tell us something we don’t already know.”

“There is no _cure_ for holy water,” Anathema says. “Not for demons.”

“I said something we _don’t_ already know.”

Aziraphale frowns at her, ignoring Crowley’s mutter. “We hardly know that for certain,” he says. “Just because we haven’t discovered it yet—”

“Aziraphale. I’m sorry, but this is hopeless. If he really does have holy water in his blood—”

“Wait, you’re saying you can’t help?” Newt asks. 

“I’m saying nothing could help,” Anathema tells them. “Except maybe a miracle.”

Crowley snorts. “Those lot don’t do miracles for the likes of me,” he says. 

“Then—”

“I’m not asking you to cure him,” Aziraphale says. He’s always known that it would be a long shot—the answer would have to be found among his books. “Just… he’s getting worse and too quickly. I need something to slow the process down.”

Anathema opens her mouth, closes it again. Her cross expression becomes something thoughtful and focused. Aziraphale recognizes the look of a fellow academic on the edge of a breakthrough. 

“I _might_ have something,” Anathema says. “Wait here.”

She disappears into the depths of the house. Aziraphale sits down next to Crowley. To his surprise, Crowley leans into his side the moment he’s seated, nearly tucking his head into Aziraphale’s shoulder. Aziraphale frowns down at him, trying to ignore how nice Crowley’s weight feels against his side—it doesn’t matter when compared to how hot he feels. Cautiously, he reaches out and presses a hand to Crowley’s forehead. He pulls back with a hiss. His fever’s risen again. 

“He doesn’t look so good,” Newt observes.

Newt, Aziraphale reminds himself, is simply a naive human who didn’t actually ask for any of this. It would be unkind to snap at him for simply stating a fact—Crowley, sweating and pale and grimacing, does not look so good. Aziraphale offers Newt a tense smile instead. Newt, perhaps realizing his faux pas, flushes a little.

“Oh!” he says. “I just meant… Well, I suppose he looks pretty good considering. You know. Holy water, demons. I wasn’t really properly trained, but even I know that’s not a combination that ends well. Like witches and fire, really.”

“He talks too much,” Crowley observes in an exhausted whisper against Aziraphale’s ear.

The brush of his lips there makes Aziraphale shiver just a little. Sternly, he reminds himself that Crowley is sick—perhaps even dying—and it’s hardly the time to notice how warm and soft his mouth is, if there ever was a time for that. 

“He’s nervous,” Aziraphale says. “Be kind, dear.”

“I’m not _nervous_ ,” Newt protests. When Aziraphale and Crowley both look at him, he cowers a little. “Well! It’s just, last time I saw you, you were— _You_ know! Stopping the end of the world! And now you’re here, sitting on the couch and cuddling.”

“We’re not _cuddling_ ,” Crowley says with deep disgust.

Aziraphale sits very still and says nothing that will give away the fact that they are actually cuddling. He gives Newt a hard look that says he’d better keep his giant mouth closed when it comes to all mentions of it if he knows what’s good for him. Newt pales a little but nods. Aziraphale relaxes. He really is a good boy. Anathema could’ve done worse.

“I’m just saying, it takes some getting used to, all of this—this business. Angels and demons and witches. Even the prophecies were—Well, the books were beyond belief, really. Did you know Agnes Nutter made a prophecy about me and Anathema—” 

Newt goes bright red. Crowley snickers against Aziraphale’s ear, but Aziraphale’s too distracted to find Crowley’s mean-spirited mirth guiltily amusing.

“Book _s_?” he asks. “What do you mean, books? There was only one book of prophecy, wasn’t there?”

Newt’s guilty look deepens. “Oh! Oh, yes, of course—”

“Now, he’s _lying_ ,” Crowley observes in the lazy voice that actually means he’s quite focused on the task at hand, sharp as a bloodhound even through his fever. “I wonder why good old Newt would need to lie to us, angel?”

“Now, see here—”

“I was wondering quite the same,” Aziraphale says in his sternest voice. “Newton?” 

Newt crumples under the force of their combined stares. He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a crumpled square of stained white cloth. He blots at his forehead. 

“Oh, very well,” he says crossly. “Not long after the Apocalypse, Anathema got a delivery from Agnes.”

“ _From_ Agnes?” Aziraphale asks with disbelief.

“It’s mad,” Newt agrees, though Aziraphale was really marveling at yet another reveal of Agnes Nutter’s unending ingenuity. What a lady! “But she managed it somehow.”

“And what was in this special package?” Crowley asks.

Newt hesitates. Aziraphale frowns at him and he sighs deeply, shoving his dirty handkerchief back in his pocket. Aziraphale resists the urge to tell him it should be folded.

“A book,” Newt says. “Another book of prophecies.”

Aziraphale’s focus narrows abruptly. “Another book of prophecies?” he asks as hope begins to dawn. “Another—By the Lord. Do you have it?”

Newt’s face spasms. “Ah—”

“What’s it matter about an old book?” Crowley asks.

“No, you don’t understand!” Aziraphale says, his excitement rising. “Agnes Nutter has entirely accurate prophecies! If she foresaw this attack, she might have the answer we need to heal you!”

“That’s a stretch,” Crowley says, though he sounds thoughtful.

“It’s a _chance_. She foresaw so much about us otherwise, why wouldn’t she see this, too? At the very least, she might be able to give us a hint at what to do next! Newt, the book! Where is it? Oh, if we can check it—”

Newt looks absolutely terrible when Aziraphale looks at him again. His wide, wet eyes are so guilty that Aziraphale’s heart begins to sink before he even starts talking.

“It’s gone,” Newt says in a strangled voice. “We—we burned it.”

Aziraphale’s heart drops to the floor. “Burned it.” His voice sounds strange as if he’s hearing it from a great distance. “You… you burned it.”

“Anathema, she didn’t—well. She decided it was for the best.”

“For the _best_?” 

“Angel?” Crowley sounds alarmed, but Aziraphale finds that he can’t really focus on that past his own building rage. “Aziraphale?”

“—found it! I’m not sure if it will help, but the effects should lessen—”

Aziraphale’s not surprised that Anathema stops talking the moment she sees his face, pausing in the doorway with raising eyebrows. He’s not sure what his face looks like, but he can imagine that it’s not actually very pleasant. Aziraphale feels far from pleasant right now.

He narrows his eyes at Anathema. 

“You burned Agnes’ book,” he says.

Her face shutters. “Yes. I did.”

Aziraphale’s body feels like an over-tuned guitar, strung too tight. “We might have found an answer in that,” he says. “She might have known what to do or pointed us in the right direction to find Crowley’s cure. You might have had the answer to everything and you _burned it_!”

“Aziraphale,” Crowley says. 

It’s not his voice that gets Aziraphale’s attention. It’s the careful hand he brings to Aziraphale’s face, the gentlest of touches to his cheek. Aziraphale sucks in a deep, shuddery breath. He curls and uncurls his hands, useless with frustration and hating himself for feeling so deeply angry at someone who he knows does not deserve it. 

“I can’t apologize,” Anathema says. She crosses her arms over her chest, hands still full of green and purple herbs. “I’m not sorry about burning the book. I’ve lived my entire life according to prophecies—I won’t do it again. But I _am_ sorry that I can’t help you, Aziraphale.” Her eyes are dark and solemn, fixed on Aziraphale’s face. “You know as well as I do that nothing Agnes could have written would have made a difference anyhow.”

“You _don’t_ know that,” Aziraphale says, a touch too loud.

“Yes she does, angel,” Crowley says.

Aziraphale breathes hard through his nose. “Everyone thought there was nothing to be done about the Apocalypse,” he reminds them in his firmest voice. “But we stopped that, didn’t we?”

Anathema’s look is distinctly pitying. “If your husband’s already been poisoned, then—”

“That’s just it! He should _already_ be—be gone, but he’s not, is he? That means there must be a way to stop it, get rid of it somehow.”

Anathema shakes her head. Aziraphale can tell he hasn’t convinced her, but she gives up on telling him so, which he’s grateful for. He has enough trouble with that from Crowley, he doesn’t need any more naysayers telling him that he can’t accomplish what he _has_ to accomplish.

“Here,” Anathema says, unfolding her arms and offering the plants in her hands to Aziraphale. “You can crush them and add them to food and tea. I’m not sure how effective they’ll be—I’ve never been able to try them on an injured demon, obviously—but they should help with the pain, at least.”

Aziraphale accepts them and passes them off to Crowley, who sniffs at them and begins to examine them suspiciously. Aziraphale smiles a little, the last of his anger fading. It’s useless to be angry with Anathema, he reminds himself. Of course she wouldn’t want to have more prophecies dictating her life. But he still can’t stop the stab of regret at losing a second book. They could have helped. 

“Thank you,” Aziraphale says. 

“Don’t worry about it,” Anathema says. “After what you did to help us, it’s the least I can do to help. Do…” She glances at Crowley, still looking at the plants, then back to Aziraphale. “Do we need to be worried about another attack or something?”

Aziraphale frowns at her but Crowley’s the one who answers. “Nothing like that,” he tells her, not looking at her. “They just came for me. No more Apocalypses on the horizon, scout’s honor.”

“You were definitely not a scout,” Anathema says, a little amused.

“No, of course not. Corrupted a few of them though, they’re right easy to corrupt. Barely even need to tempt them and—”

“Oh, all right, enough of that,” Aziraphale says. “Anathema, tell us about Adam. Has he been settling in all right during the new school year?”

He wants something to distract Crowley, keep him from thinking about his pain. Anathema’s look says she’s on to him, but she allows the subject change and they chat for a long time about Adam and the Them and their various escapades.

* * *

To Crowley’s obvious shock, Anathema hugs him as they leave. She says something in his ear as she pulls away and Crowley stares at her, mouth open. Aziraphale waits until they’re on their way back to the car, Crowley draped on Aziraphale’s shoulder, to ask about it.

“She said sorry,” Crowley says quietly, obviously disquieted. “And that she hopes you prove her wrong.”

Aziraphale’s stomach clenches. He hopes so, too.

* * *

Crowley falls back into an exhausted sleep as they drive back into the city. He doesn't dream and doesn’t wake until the hum of the Bentley turns to silence. 

He blinks blearily out the window. They’re not at his apartment. Aziraphale’s pulled up outside of the darkened bookshop. 

“Angel?” he asks. 

Aziraphale’s still sitting in the driver’s seat, his hands still on the wheel as if he plans to pull out at any moment. Half in shadow, he looks strange, almost alien—his pale hair turned silver, his normally sweet face made unknown and fey. Crowley shivers.

“Aziraphale?” he asks again.

Aziraphale shakes his head. He takes his hands off the driving wheel and turns to Crowley with a loose, uncertain smile. With a trembling hand, he reaches out and gently brushes his fingers against Crowley’s chin. Crowley closes his eyes, relaxing. 

“I think we should move into the bookshop,” Aziraphale says.

Crowley opens his eyes. “Move?” he asks, nonplussed. 

“Your apartment isn’t safe,” Aziraphale explains. “The bookshop is protected, even if your kind thinks to look here. Since we’re already out, it’ll be easier for you to move here now then if we settle back in your apartment.” Crowley gets the idea that Aziraphale might have spent the drive thinking up his arguments; they’re all too concise to be on-the-spot. “Not to mention, it’ll be easier for me to continue my research here.” 

Crowley considers it as Aziraphale watches him. “You really don’t mind me being here?” Aziraphale’s stayed with him before, but Crowley’s never stayed with Aziraphale. 

“Of course not,” Aziraphale says. “And obviously, if you’re more comfortable in your home—”

“It’s fine,” Crowley says. At this point, the sheer thought of going anywhere is enough to make him feel tired; they might as well just stay here. “The bookshop, it’s fine.” 

Aziraphale smiles, relieved, but then his forehead crumples. “Oh, but your new plants—!”

“We can go get them,” Crowley reassures him, then remembers he’s not supposed to be the reassuring type and huffs. “Not that we _need_ to.”

Aziraphale doesn’t buy it, damn him. He’s smiling. 

“We’ll go collect them and come back here,” he says. 

“Do you even have a bed?” Crowley asks, skeptical.

Aziraphale flushes. “I can make one!” he says. “How hard can it be?” When Crowley continues to look at him, he sighs. “I’m sure you can help me out, my dear.”

Crowley snorts. “Sure,” he agrees.

* * *

Crowley’s spent a lot of time in Aziraphale’s bookshop over the years—he likes to think he knows it reasonably well and is probably the only person outside of Aziraphale himself who can find things in it with any ease. But he’s always been there as a guest before, so he’s never seen the upstairs flat.

Aziraphale’s little flat above is clearly never really lived in. There’s furniture, but it’s scattered so absentmindedly throughout the one-room apartment that it’s clear Aziraphale put it in as an afterthought without any real planning. A bed that is struggling to be as large as Crowley’s in so cramped a space has been wedged in the corner of the room. 

Aziraphale flushes as Crowley looks around the room and clears his throat. “Home sweet home!” he cries. “Come, you should sit. Let me make some tea—”

Crowley lets him fuss. He still feels groggy and achy from the long ride, his bones protesting as he slides down on the large bed. His fever has abated a little but the room is still too-hot and his skin feels tender and bruised. The mattress is firmer than he likes, but otherwise, it's a blessing to no longer be vertical. Crowley sighs and rubs at his eyes, taking off his sunglasses and tucking them into his shirt pocket. 

A cup of hot tea materializes at his elbow. Crowley props himself up and takes it from Aziraphale wearily. 

“You really think it’s any safer here?” he asks. “I don’t think my people will be popping back ‘round any time soon. As far as they know, I’m already dead.”

Aziraphale flinches. He sits down on the bed next to Crowley, his own cup of tea balanced precariously in his fingers. 

“Adam put in some safety measures when he re-made the shop. We’re as safe as we can be,” he says. “But you really don’t think they’ll check?”

“We’re not great at the follow-up,” Crowley says. “How do you think we got away with the Antichrist stunt for so long?”

Aziraphale smiles a little, rueful. “I suppose. But should they find their way here, they will be facing the consequences of whatever an 11-year-old boy’s imagination can conjure up, so I think we’ll be able to keep them away.” He shrugs. “And I can continue researching here more easily.”

“How can you even research… whatever this is?” Crowley asks. “It’s never happened before, has it? I’m a walking, talking experiment here.”

“There’s some precedent,” Aziraphale says. “Holy water has been used as a weapon against your kind since you were created. Very few of you have survived in any encounter with it, of course, but I hope to find something that will help me understand the way it affects you so that I can go about changing it.”

“ _Changing_ it? Can you even do that to holy water? It’s… you know. Holy and all that.”

“It has to be possible.” Aziraphale’s mouth thins into a white line. “If it’s not… Crowley, my dear, I don’t know what else we can do. It’s poisoning you—our only answer is to find some way to extract it or change it so that it no longer hurts you. Otherwise…”

“Yeah,” Crowley agrees, sipping his tea. “Otherwise I’m not going to last the month.”

“I wish you wouldn’t say that.”

“What else am I supposed to say, angel? I can feel what it’s doing to this body—I’m lucky I didn’t die immediately. I know you think you can find something but—”

“Crowley, I _will_ find something.”

“You don’t know that! And your little witch didn’t have anything for us, so—”

“Her herbs will be quite useful,” Aziraphale says. “I’ve put some in your tea. Don’t you feel a little better?”

Crowley sniffs suspiciously at the tea. “Why would you put it in tea? Ruins a perfectly nice cup.”

He ignores the fact that his cup is almost empty, though Aziraphale smiles at him. Crowley takes mental stock of his body. He doesn’t really feel better, but he doesn’t feel worse, either, which is surprising since just the act of sitting up and talking has begun to take all of his energy. Maybe the witch _does_ have some use, he admits privately to himself. But her little tricks are hardly going to do more than put some roadblocks on the poison in his system.

“I just need time,” Aziraphale says. “Please. I can do this, I know I can.”

Crowley sighs. The thing is, he really does believe that if anyone can do it, it’d be Aziraphale. Aziraphale’s so clever and he’s the only one Crowley would ever even begin to think could find a fix to so impossible a problem. But there are some things that just aren’t _meant_ to be fixed and Crowley’s becoming more and more sure that his slow slide to death is one of them. There are, whatever Aziraphale or even he likes to think, some fixed facts to the universe. Crowley can rail against them but he can hardly ignore them, especially now. Aziraphale can try to circumvent them as much as he wants, but Crowley doesn’t know that he’ll actually succeed.

But what’s the harm in letting him try? Crowley _does_ feel a little better. Maybe Aziraphale can pull off the impossible once more. And if not… well, there’s worse ways to spend his final days than in Aziraphale’s company.

“Okay,” he says. “Go read your dusty books, then. I’m taking a nap.”

Aziraphale brightens. He leans over and presses an affectionate kiss to Crowley’s forehead. “Thank you, my dear,” he says.

Crowley flushes and drains the rest of his tea in one solid gulp to cover it up. “Don’t thank me,” he says. “I still don’t think this is going to work.”

“It will,” Aziraphale tells him. His eyes are bright, determined. “I’m going to save you, Crowley. I promise.” 

* * *

Having Crowley around the shop, Aziraphale thinks a few days later, is like having a grumpy stray cat suddenly living with him. 

Aziraphale’s never really worked with only people before. Before the shop, he largely didn’t work at all, other than his jobs for heaven—he has little interest in human commerce and finds their dedication to the tedium of the work-day largely incomprehensible. When he acquired the bookshop, he thought about hiring a human to come and take care of the things that he largely doesn’t want to think about—namely, the customers—but he ultimately decided that he had no real interest in having someone else flitting around his shop.

Crowley, of course, is Crowley and therefore different, but it’s still strange. He spends most of the morning in Aziraphale’s flat, resting. But most afternoons he hobbles down the stairs and stretches out on the comfortable couch Aziraphale put in among the back shelves, curled under a blanket and watching everything Aziraphale does. The first day, it makes Aziraphale so uneasy that he drops a number of books and utterly forgets what he’s doing from one moment to the next.

The few customers who come in seem to find him fascinating, especially the younger people. Crowley, always better with humans than Aziraphale, answers their questions in a bored drawl and manages to get them to leave him alone after only a few minutes. Even the more persistent ones don’t bother him that much, though there’s a lot of covert staring. Aziraphale’s not really sure why Crowley is so intriguing to them—his unusual eyes are covered when he’s down in the bookshop and without them, he looks much like any other human. 

Paler, of course, and sicker. Every day, he weakens further, though Anathema’s little stock of herbs has helped ease some of the symptoms. Most nights, Aziraphale has to help him back up the stairs. When he points out to Crowley he might be more comfortable if he stays up in the flat during the day, Crowley shrugs.

“Wouldn’t be able to stand that,” he says shortly. “Besides, it’s more fun to watch you putter around.”

Aziraphale drops it. He doesn’t want to make Crowley’s days any worse than they already are—if he finds some comfort in being down in the bookshop, watching Aziraphale do extremely boring things like reading his books and trying to ward off nosey customers then so be it. 

It’s also strange to live with someone. Aziraphale’s only ever really used his flat as an afterthought, a place he can if he needs to get away from the shop. But now it’s become somewhere he actually returns to every night, if only to put Crowley to bed. The furniture’s been rearranged into actual order and the place has begun to feel a little more like an actual home instead of just a convenient room to relax in. 

He and Crowley sit up and talk most evenings, meandering conversations that rarely acknowledge why Crowley is in Aziraphale’s flat at all. It is, Aziraphale acknowledges a little guiltily, disturbingly nice to have Crowley around all the time. If he could forget why Crowley is there, if Crowley wasn’t always so pale and tired, it would even be perfect.

* * *

By the end of the week, Aziraphale is no closer to an answer. He’s turned his bookshop upside down, searched through his old contacts in the antique book world, read everything he could get his hands on… But the fruits of his labors are meager. All he really knows is that it really is impossible that Crowley is still walking around. He should be dead. 

Aziraphale’s own headaches taper off as the week comes to an end, though he still feels strung out from so many long hours of research. Crowley, on the other hand, seems to get worse; he spends more mornings throwing up in the new bathroom Aziraphale created and he can’t keep any food down at all. His sleep is restless, too—half of the time he wakes up in the middle of the night and comes to sit with Aziraphale instead. 

It’s not good, Aziraphale forces himself to acknowledge as he locks up the shop for the weekend and makes his trek up the stairs to the flat. Crowley couldn’t even bring himself to come downstairs today—he’d tried and ended up sitting on the stairs for an hour before Aziraphale had worried enough to come check on him. Aziraphale had had to help him back to bed. 

He needs a break, Aziraphale thinks. Some kind of hint. Or _help_. He wishes there was someone he could ask, someone who might actually have an answer for him. There are so few people who really know anything about demons—and asking the demons themselves is obviously out of the question. But among angels… Aziraphale’s hand pauses on the door handle of the flat, caught on an idea. Among angels… there might be someone who has an answer. Maybe.

A crash. Aziraphale abandons the germ of a plan as he throws himself through the door, heart racing, to find Crowley sprawled on the floor. 

“Dearest!” 

As he throws himself down on the floor, ignoring the way it jars his knees, he searches frantically for any injuries, any signs of further deterioration or fever. But Crowley looks okay, other than the embarrassed flush climbing up his neck. He’s wearing the pajamas Aziraphale made for him and a blanket around his shoulders. 

“‘M fine,” he says, shrugging off Aziraphale’s searching hands and rubbing at his shoulder. “I was just—” He glances over. 

Aziraphale follows his eyes and blinks when he realizes that his old radio is on the floor next to them. It’s hideously out-dated now, of course, but Aziraphale remembers using it quite often until a few years ago. He’d put it away somewhere, he remembers—the hall closet, maybe? It’s an old dinosaur of a machine and he realizes, suddenly, what had probably made Crowley fall. He glances back at Crowley to find him staring at the ceiling, still blushing. Aziraphale smiles a little, relaxing now that he knows the fall isn’t yet another sign of Crowley’s deterioration.

“It’s been some time since I’ve used this old girl,” Aziraphale tells him. “Come on, let’s get it set up.”

“We don’t have to—”

“Oh, it’s time she be put to use again, I think. Shall we?”

He collects the radio and puts it on the coffee table. It’s not really that heavy, but it has enough heft to it that he’s not surprised that it upset Crowley’s already delicate balance. He returns to help Crowley to the sofa and settles him in before turning his attention to the radio. With a small snap, it turns on, flicking mindlessly through stations. It comes to stop at a station playing a slow, soft jazz song. Crowley lets out a sigh, leaning against Aziraphale’s shoulder.

“It’s nice,” he admits. “Was too quiet in here.”

Aziraphale relaxes against the sofa, listening. He’s never cared much for human music, not like Crowley, but this one’s old-fashioned too and it reminds him of the last world war. 

“Do you remember all the dances they used to have?” he asks Crowley.

“When?” 

“World War II.”

“Oh, _that_. Yes, they were always holding their little parties. Good places to do a little bit of temptation.”

Aziraphale snorts. “Oh, don’t tell me that. I always quite enjoyed those parties.”

“Tedious, if you ask me. Stank of desperation.”

“The dancing was quite nice.”

“Well, you _would_ think so, being an angel.”

“Excuse me!”

“Everyone knows angels can’t dance.”

“I’ll have you know I’m quite accomplished at the gavotte!”

He turns his head in time to catch Crowley’s barking laughter. Aziraphale should want to puff up in indignation, but he can only smile too, helplessly. It’s nice to see Crowley looking so relaxed.

“You? The _gavotte_? I’ll believe that when I see it, angel.”

“Oh?” Aziraphale says. He stands and turns to offer Crowley his hand. “Come on, I’ll show you.”

Crowley stares up at him. He’s not wearing his sunglasses—he’s taken to leaving them off more often than not in the flat. His yellow eyes are darker in the dim light of the apartment, almost gold. Crowley licks his lips. 

“Not sure I’m up for a dance like that, angel,” he says. 

On the radio, the song switches over. A brassy guitar solo turns into a crooning voice. _Only you… can make this world seem bright…_

“Well,” Aziraphale says, contemplating Crowley’s soft hair and sharp face. “Why don’t we try something else, then? I have to prove myself, after all.”

Crowley looks at Aziraphale’s hand, then back to his face again. Hesitantly, he reaches out and allows Aziraphale to pull him to his feet. Aziraphale reels Crowley in until they’re standing close, practically nose to nose. Aziraphale puts a careful hand on Crowley’s waist and puts Crowley’s hand on his shoulder. The song continues on, slow and mournful. _Only you, and you alone, can thrill me like you do…_

Crowley’s so warm now, all the time. Aziraphale ignores that and begins to turn them in determined, wobbly circles. Crowley laughs a little, the tension Aziraphale can feel under his hand dissipating. 

“You’re not really proving yourself,” he tells Aziraphale. “This is terrible.”

“It is _not_ ,” Aziraphale says and turns them again, a little more gracefully. “Come on, it’s rather good, isn’t it?”

Crowley’s smiling down at him. “For an angel, maybe,” he says. 

_Only you… Can make this change in me…_

Aziraphale swallows. His next turn is a little too sharp and Crowley makes a sound, legs buckling and nearly bringing them both to the ground. Aziraphale stabilizes them before they can fall.

“Angel—” Crowley says, not smiling anymore. 

“Come on,” Aziraphale says. “Lean on me, dearest. I’ve got you.”

Crowley hesitates but Aziraphale keeps swaying. When he finally relaxes, dropping more of his weight into Aziraphale’s hands, Aziraphale’s heart swells. They keep making messy circles around Aziraphale’s tiny living room, drawing closer and closer until they sway together chest-to-chest. _You’re my dream come true, my one and only you…_

The music fades out into static, but he and Crowley don’t stop dancing immediately. They stay close together for several long moments, swaying still.

“Angel,” Crowley murmurs. 

Aziraphale reaches for him, threading his hands in Crowley’s hair. Crowley opens his mouth, eyes wide and dilated, but Aziraphale’s already rising to his toes to press his lips to Crowley’s in a messy, warm kiss. 

Crowley’s mouth is firm, narrow. It softens under Aziraphale’s and Aziraphale’s whole body feels like it fills with sunlight.

“Aziraphale,” Crowley tells him as they pull apart. “You really do have shit timing.”

Aziraphale should be offended, but he’s too happy to snipe back. He just beams at Crowley instead, because it doesn’t matter what Crowley’s saying when he looks like that, flushed and smiling just a little at the corner of his mouth, hair mussed and eyes over-bright. He looks good enough to eat and so _happy_. Aziraphale wants to kiss him again. 

“I’m sorry,” he says, though he isn’t and Crowley’s look says he knows that, too. “I just—wanted to. Didn’t you?”

“Of course I did,” Crowley says, dismissive. “But this is a… very bad idea.”

“What?”

“Aziraphale, I’m…”

Aziraphale’s body feels like it's been drenched in cold water. He takes a step back from Crowley but he doesn’t take his hands away from Crowley. Because he knows that if he does, Crowley probably won’t be able to stand on his own. Because Crowley isn’t just unwell, he’s dying. 

“Angel?” A hand to his cheek. Aziraphale forces himself to look in Crowley’s eyes. “I want this too, okay? I’ve wanted it for a long time. But right now all this is going to do is hurt you.”

“What if I don’t care?” Aziraphale says. 

“I care,” Crowley says. His face creases with a sad smile. “Angel, we need to face the facts here. I’m not getting any better and you’re not finding anything. If we do this, it’s just going to make it worse when I… when…”

No, no, _no_. “I promised you I’d fix it,” Aziraphale says, reaching out to take Crowley’s hand in his. “I told you, you’re not allowed to die. I’ll fix it.” He _has_ to fix it. 

Crowley contemplates him for a long time. “All right,” he says. “We’ll talk about it when you do, then. How about that?”

Aziraphale doesn’t want to do that, but he has a feeling Crowley isn’t going to budge about it. He’s a stubborn one, Aziraphale’s demon. He squeezes Crowley’s hand.

“All right,” he says. “If that’s what you want.”

“Well, what I want isn’t really possible right now anyway,” Crowley says. 

“Oh? What’s that?”

Crowley’s grin is wide and wicked. “Well, I’d like to get in that bed with you and do something that would _really_ get our hearts racing.”

Aziraphale flushes and then slaps Crowley’s arm when he begins to laugh. “You really are a demon,” he says. “Teasing me so.”

Crowley grins at him. “Think of it as proper motivation to find a cure,” he says.

* * *

That night, after Crowley finally drops into an exhausted sleep, Aziraphale sits down with a pen and a plain piece of paper. He doesn’t want to do this—he’s not even sure it’s not going to cause more harm than good. But he has no answers and hasn't been able to find anything. And after tonight, after having Crowley in his arms… Aziraphale rubs hard at his eyes. He has to do everything he can, turn over every stone. And this is the best bet he has. He has to roll the dice because the cost of not taking the risk is a price he isn’t willing to pay. 

He puts the pen to paper. He begins to write.

* * *

The shop bell tinkles and Aziraphale sighs, rubbing his eyes. He’s in no mood to deal with nosy customers trying to steal his books, especially after spending all day trying to make heads-or-tails of the latest antique book he found on demon biology.

“Excuse me, we’re actually not—” 

As he looks up, he freezes. Gabriel’s smile exposes all of his teeth. 

“Hello, _brother_ ,” he says. “Long time no see.”

Aziraphale has to swallow several times before he can try to speak. He’s not sure what it is about Gabriel that wrecks his confidence so. He forces himself to think of Crowley, growing ever weaker, and that helps him straighten up and meet Gabriel’s amused, poisonous stare head-on.

“Gabriel,” he says. “I didn’t think you’d actually come.”

“After that message?” Gabriel lets out a disbelieving breath, stepping further into the bookshop. “It’s not every day you hear the Apocalypse’s Bane begging for your help, is it?”

“What?” Aziraphale says, appalled. “ _Apocalypse’s Bane_?”

“It’s what they’ve taken to calling you upstairs,” Gabriel tells him. He seems to misinterpret Aziraphale’s distaste and sighs. “I know, I know, it’s rather trite. They really don’t have that much imagination, the foot soldiers. But your little escapades made quite the impression. They’re calling you all sorts of things—The Lord’s Right Hand, the Unquenchable Flame…”

“Lord,” Aziraphale says in horror. “I didn’t do it to _make an impression_. I simply wanted to stop the end of the world.”

The room around them seems to grow darker, the shadows deepening. Gabriel takes another step closer. He’s still smiling, but that means very little with Gabriel. He’s always smiling.

“Oh, _that_.” Gabriel waves a hand, but Aziraphale’s no fool—he can see the rage that simmers below Gabriel’s casual nonchalance. “No, no. I meant your dramatic departure from our ranks, brother. You had everyone talking for _days_.”

“My—dramatic departure?” 

Crowley, Aziraphale remember with growing horror, had never said much about his trip to heaven. He’d listened to Aziraphale’s story of his farce of a trial with a smirk, especially when Aziraphale got to the part about the rubber ducky and the towel, but he’d said—Lord, he’d said _nothing_ at all of his own escapades except that they’d tried to burn him and he’d managed to make them back off. Aziraphale realizes now that he’d been so caught up in the euphoria of finally being free that he’d never even thought to actually question Crowley about it. 

What _had_ Crowley done, exactly?

“What’s good, Gabriel?”

_Oh no,_ Aziraphale thinks with rising horror, but Gabriel’s already turning the full force of his smile on Crowley. Crowley stares back at him, unimpressed and sneering. He has his sunglasses on and a dark coat is covering the pajamas that Aziraphale suspects he’s still wearing. He even has some color in his cheeks. If he weren’t leaning so heavily against the nearest bookshelf, he’d almost look like his old self. 

“The infamous Crowley.” Gabriel gives Crowley a thorough once-over, smile deepening. “We didn’t have a chance to chat, last time. 

“Yeah,” Crowley says, unaffected. “You were busy making a huge ass out of yourself.”

Gabriel’s face tightens. “I can see why you defected now, Aziraphale,” he says in his most pleasant voice. “He really _is_ rather nice to look at, isn’t he, even in a human body? Is that how he got you—using the oldest temptation in the book?”

Aziraphale flushes, half embarrassed and half furious. Of course _he_ knows that Crowley’s handsome—he’s spent 6,000 years stealing covert glances and seeing Crowley in every kind of fashion there’s ever been!—but he doesn’t like Gabriel for saying it like _that_ , like Crowley’s only real appeal is the flesh he inhabits. As if Aziraphale wouldn’t love him no matter what body he inhabits!

But Crowley doesn’t seem offended. He even smiles, though it exposes the dangerous points of his eyeteeth, leftovers from his early days as a snake.

“If I look good enough to make an angel fall, I’m doing my job right,” he says. “But that's not why Aziraphale left and you know it, _brother_.”

Gabriel recoils. “You,” he says, “are no brother of mine.”

“Once upon a time, I was,” Crowley says. Something in his voice changes, turning sarcasm into something nostalgic, almost sad. “Don’t you remember, Gabriel? You were there when I was born. You held my hand when I first came into this world.”

Gabriel jerks. Aziraphale has never seen him caught so off-guard, not even during their conversation during the Apocalypse. He looks between them, confused. He’d never thought Crowley remembered his time before his Fall, let alone that he actually knew any of the angels he’d left behind so closely. And if Gabriel had actually been there when Crowley was born, then that would make Crowley something… 

Well. Something much grander than Aziraphale had ever imagined. Could it possibly be true? 

Aziraphale doesn’t get much of a chance to ponder it or to ask any of his burning questions. Crowley takes a step forward but his expression crumples and his knees buckle and he begins an immediate collapse on the floor.

“Crowley!” Aziraphale rushes to his side in time to catch him before he finishes his fall. Crowley curves into him, panting against his shoulder. As ever, he is too warm. “Oh, dear. You shouldn’t have left the sofa! I keep telling you, you really should stay upstairs and _rest_ —”

“What’s wrong with him?”

Aziraphale looks up. Gabriel doesn’t sound concerned at all, but his indifference is better than his cheerful malice. Aziraphale can work with indifference. He steels himself and tightens his grip on Crowley’s shoulder, tucking him more firmly into Aziraphale’s side. Crowley’s breathing is ragged.

“Another demon stabbed him,” Aziraphale says, “using a knife coated in holy water.”

Gabriel’s eyebrows shoot up. He crouches down to their level, looking more closely at Crowley.

“Well, well,” he says. “Are you sure? He seems disturbingly alive for a demon who’s been in contact with holy water.”

Crowley grunts. “‘M sure.”

Gabriel cocks his head. He looks between Aziraphale and Crowley as if he’s trying to figure something out, make a puzzle with broken pieces. 

“He’s dying,” Aziraphale says. “Slowly, from the inside out. If it continues like this, he only has two weeks left, maybe less.”

Gabriel straightens back to his full height, looking down on them with a cocked head and a smile.

“So?” he asks.

Aziraphale can feel his fingers digging into Crowley’s boney shoulder. He forces himself to loosen his grip and reminds himself that he knew this was going to be difficult. He needs to keep a calm and cool head, here, or Gabriel will never hear him out. He keeps his voice even by sheer will alone.

“Nothing in any of my books has been able to help me stop it,” he says. “But you… You’ve been around longer than almost anyone, Gabriel. The Lord favors you. You’re an archangel. I thought, maybe, you might…?”

Gabriel’s laugh is beautiful because everything about Gabriel’s human form is meant to be beautiful. That doesn’t cover up the spite simmering underneath it, of course.

“I might do what?” he asks, full of scorn. “ _Help_ you? Help _him_?” He shakes his head, clicking his tongue. “My, my. Aziraphale, I know you’re not quite an angel anymore but this is an entirely new low for you. Saving a _demon’s_ life?”

Aziraphale’s vision is going funny at the edges, strangely white. He knows he is still holding Crowley, but he can’t quite feel him anymore. All of his focus is on Gabriel and his poisonous smile, his unkind words. 

“You won’t help me?” Aziraphale’s voice sounds strange too, wintry and distant. “He’ll die if you don’t, Gabriel. I can’t—” Aziraphale coughs, tries again. God, this hurts to say. “I can’t save him on my own.”

He feels Crowley jerk against his shoulder, but he refuses to look away from Gabriel.

“He’s a _demon_!” Gabriel throws up his hands. “Our sworn enemy! You aren’t supposed to _save_ him, Aziraphale, you’re supposed to celebrate his demise!”

Aziraphale grits his teeth. Time to try a different approach. 

“Fine,” he says. “Don’t help him, help _me_.”

“You?”

“Yes, _me_. I’m your brother, aren’t I? Your comrade? I did so much valuable work for you down here on Earth for so many years and asked for nothing in return. If you won’t do it for Crowley’s sake, do it for _mine_ , Gabriel!”

Gabriel shakes his head. “You cannot be serious,” he says. “After ruining all of our hard work with the Apocalypse and that big dramatic exit, you really think I’m going to help the likes of you? You’re no brother of mine any more than he is, Aziraphale!”

Aziraphale’s skin feels too small for his body. “Please,” he says. “ _Please_.”

Gabriel’s smile finally disappears. “I know you, Aziraphale. You have your pride, even if it’s not really an angel’s pride. But you’re seriously coming crawling back to us for help, after doing everything you could to thumb your nose at us, all for the sake of a _demon_?”

“For Crowley, I would do anything,” Aziraphale says firmly.

“Once upon a time,” Crowley says. Aziraphale jumps. Crowley’s been so uncharacteristically quiet that Aziraphale quite forgot he was even there. He’s still curled up into Aziraphale’s side, but he’s looking directly at Gabriel, mouth pursed. “You called me brother and we walked the stars together. Or are you so old you’ve already forgotten, Gabriel?”

“Don’t you start with me,” Gabriel tells him. “You went down with Lucifer, this is what you get. You're not part of the family anymore.” 

“Gabriel,” Crowley says. He sounds tired. “You still owe me one.”

Gabriel stares at Crowley, then lets out a laugh that’s very different from his usual one—less beautiful and more of a bark. It’s the most genuine sound Aziraphale’s ever heard him make. 

“You want to play it _that_ way?” Crowley just stares at him. “Oh, fine,” Gabriel says. “Who knows? It might be fun.”

Aziraphale tenses as Gabriel crouches down again, closer than before. He reaches out to touch Crowley’s forehead and Aziraphale knocks his hand away before he can think about what he’s doing. Gabriel pauses, looking at Aziraphale with curious mirth.

“Peace,” he says. “Your demon is cashing in an old favor. It’d be a shame to waste it.”

Aziraphale frowns—what _favor_ is this anyway?—but he doesn’t stop Gabriel as he reaches out again, pressing three fingers firmly in the center of Crowley’s forehead. Gabriel closes his eyes. For a long moment, there is only the sound of Crowley’s ragged breathing in the shop and Aziraphale wonders if anything will happen at all. Then the air begins to thicken with a pale haze around Gabriel. It travels down his arm and begins to surround Crowley as well. Slowly, it brightens. 

Crowley lets out a pained sound. He feels hotter than ever. Gabriel’s brow begins to wrinkle, deep grooves appearing between his eyebrows. After another minute, as the light brightens to a near-gold, Gabriel breaks his connection to Crowley with a sharp gasp, pulling his fingers back into his chest as if they’ve been burned. 

Crowley’s wheezing, taking in great gulps of air. Aziraphale pulls him into a hug and stares at Gabriel over the top of his head. 

“Well?” he asks. “Did you—?”

Gabriel shakes his head. “It’s useless,” he says. His voice is ragged, breathing uneven. He looks about as rumpled as Aziraphale’s ever seen him. “Your little trick didn’t work. You only bound him to you, not the other way around.”

“What?” Aziraphale frowns. “What are you talking about?”

“You don’t _know_?” Gabriel shakes his head. “Never mind. Just know that it’s pointless. You can’t save a demon from holy water, Aziraphale. The poison is already in his blood. It’s burning him up from the inside out. There’s no way to take it out of him anymore. The fact that he’s still alive right now is its own miracle.” He shrugs, recovering his nonchalance. “He won’t survive the week.”

There’s a ringing in Aziraphale’s ears. He stares at Gabriel’s relaxed face and finds himself understanding hatred for the first time in his life. He’s not thinking as he lunges up. He hears Crowley shout, but Aziraphale can’t spare more than a thought for it as he knocks Gabriel and his expensive ground to the ground. 

Aziraphale’s never really been a fighter. Even in the wars in the past, he didn’t really do much actual _fighting_ , more sitting around with the ceremonial flaming sword looking fierce and angelic. He’s never even thrown so much as a punch before, so it’s hardly any surprise that he only gets a few hits in before Gabriel manages to pin him to the ground. Aziraphale does take some pride in the fact that Gabriel looks even more rumpled than he did before, hair askew and snarling. 

“ _What_ do you think you’re—”

Gabriel falls quiet and still. Aziraphale can’t figure out why until he realizes Crowley is crouched behind Gabriel’s back, two fingers pressed to the base of Gabriel’s skull. They’re just fingers, Aziraphale thinks, but something about them has made Gabriel pause even though Crowley’s panting heavily, clearly at the end of his rope.

“Get off of him.” 

Crowley’s voice reveals how difficult this actually is for him—it wavers and breaks, barely more than an exhausted whisper. 

“Now, now,” Gabriel says. He sounds confident, but he hasn’t moved a muscle. “There’s no need to be hasty, Crowley. You’ll burn up what little time you have left trying to take me down and you and I both know that.”

Aziraphale jerks, but no one is really paying any attention to him. 

“We both know it,” Crowley agrees. “You’re just the only one who _cares_.”

Gabriel’s mouth firms. Slowly, he gets off of Aziraphale. Aziraphale sits up, still a little dazed. 

“You have to help him,” he says. His fury is melting away, replaced by fear. Gabriel had been his last resort, a desperate hail mary. Without him— “Gabriel, you have to—”

“Aziraphale,” Gabriel says. The lack of condemnation in his voice is almost worse than his spite. Perhaps Gabriel knows that. “Even if I wanted to help, I can’t. What it would take is more than I could ever give—not that I ever would. It’s beyond me. Your boyfriend’s dead meat walking. The sooner you resign yourself to that, the easier it’s going to be for you.”

Aziraphale’s vision swims. He reaches up and finds his cheeks wet.

“Angel,” Crowley says. He leans forward and presses his thumbs to Aziraphale’s cheeks, wiping away his tears. “Come on, don’t cry. I hate that, you know I’m useless with tears.”

Aziraphale sniffles. He reaches out and takes Crowley’s arms, reeling him in until he can hug Crowley properly. Crowley doesn’t hug back, but that hardly matters—he is a long line of heat down Aziraphale’s front, real and present and _alive_. What is Aziraphale going to do when that’s no longer true? How is he supposed to live in a world where Crowley _isn’t_? Crowley’s always been there, since the beginning.

Crowley pulls back after a moment, frowning. “Angel—” 

“Well,” Gabriel says loudly, interrupting. “This has been a complete waste of my valuable time. Aziraphale, do me a favor and don’t contact heaven again. I didn’t kill you because, honestly, it’s way below my pay grade and I was curious what could have made you reach out after leaving like you did. Next time, I won’t be so nice—and neither will anyone else. You’re on your own from here on out.”

He turns. Before he reaches the door, he pauses and looks back over his shoulder at them. His eyes linger on Crowley.

“This is what you deserve,” he says, though his voice is strangely gentle. “You Fell. This is your punishment.”

Crowley looks back at him. “Worth it,” he says. 

Gabriel snorts and shakes his head. “I will never understand you two,” he mutters and disappears through the door.

Aziraphale feels strangely numb, disconnected from his own body almost like he’s been ejected from it again. He stares at where Gabriel disappeared. Crowley’s warm hand to his cheek pulls him back to himself. When he turns his head, he can see his face reflected in Crowley’s dark glasses—pale, tear-stained, strange.

“You really called Gabriel?” Crowley asks. “To help me? Not your brightest plan, angel.”

“I thought—” Aziraphale’s voice is strange, choked and rough. He clears his throat. “I thought if anyone knew how to stop this…” 

“Angel,” Crowley says. “There is no stopping this.”

Aziraphale chokes on a quiet cry. He stands. Crowley looks up at him, his thin face so pale, so tired. Aziraphale hates seeing Crowley like this, hates that every day has become a new source of pain for Crowley. 

He can’t stop himself from reaching out. He puts his hand in Crowley’s thick hair. Crowley reaches up and covers Aziraphale’s wrist. 

“Angel?” he asks.

“I’m sorry,” Aziraphale chokes out and yanks his hand away from Crowley entirely.

He’s out of the room before Crowley can say a word.

* * *

Crowley leans against the bathroom door. He can’t really stand on his own anymore, though he tries. It’s irritating, to be so weak. Irritating and other things, things that Crowley doesn’t like to look at directly. He’s made his own peace with his impending demise, but it’s not like he really likes to _contemplate_ it.

Aziraphale’s been in the bathroom since Gabriel’s visit. Crowley’s not sure what he’s doing in there, but it’s been hours now. Crowley wants to go to bed and he wants Aziraphale to put him there like he has been every night since they came to the bookshop. 

He sat in the bookshop for a long time after Aziraphale fled, thinking. Gabriel’s right, obviously—there’s nothing to be done for Crowley. Aziraphale’s hope was always in vain and Crowley’s always known that, as much as he wanted it turn out to turn out to be something real. And if Crowley’s death really is coming, if there really is nothing that Aziraphale can try… 

Well. He isn’t dying in this dusty bookshop, that’s for certain. And perhaps there’s something he can do to make things easier for Aziraphale as well. If he spends Crowley’s last days frantically trying to find an answer, it’s just going to make things harder for him, too.

“Angel?” he calls through the door. “You in there?”

A muffled sound that might be agreement. Crowley sighs and knocks his head against the bathroom door.

“I’ve had an idea,” he says. “I have a little cottage in the South Downs, near the Sisters. It’s not that long of a drive.”

There’s a long silence. Crowley wonders if maybe he should actually be starting to get worried about whatever Aziraphale’s doing in there when the door opens, tipping Crowley backward so abruptly that he falls flat on his back. He blinks up at Aziraphale. He looks much taller than usual from this angle.

“ _You_ have a cottage,” Aziraphale says, all incredulity, “in the _South Downs_?”

“Got it a while back,” Crowley says. “Nice enough little place. It’d be—” Removed, isolated. “—peaceful. Nice vacation.”

Under Aziraphale’s incredulous stare, Crowley sits up. Aziraphale helps him to his feet at once, though he’s still looking at him like Crowley got out his old flapper gear and started a grand dance right in front of him. Up close, it’s clear he’s been crying. Crowley’s heart twists uncomfortably at the thought.

“Are you all right?” he asks.

Aziraphale’s expression twists. “I really thought he’d do it,” he says quietly. “Crowley, I don't know what else to do. My research is going nowhere and the herbs are almost gone. Gabriel, he was… he was my last gamble. If he can’t heal you, then I don’t—I can’t—”

Crowley makes a low sound and leans more heavily into Aziraphale’s side. “I told you before that it’s useless to try, Aziraphale,” he says. “There’s no stopping this.”

“I _can’t_ believe that, Crowley! I can’t just… _let_ you go—!”

“I want to go to my cottage,” Crowley says. Aziraphale blinks at him. “It’s nice there, quiet. Or so I’ve heard. Peaceful. And I want you to… I want you to come with me. Leave the books and the research behind.”

“You want me to give up,” Aziraphale says.

“If Gabriel’s right, I only have so much time left,” Crowley says. He can’t even summon the energy to be bitter about it. “I don’t want you to spend them killing yourself to find a cure that doesn’t exist, angel. Spend them with me. Please.” 

He worries that he might have just succeeded in making Aziraphale cry again, but Aziraphale manages to keep from crumpling. He nods instead.

“All right,” he says. “We’ll go tomorrow morning, first thing.”

* * *

The drive down to the South Downs is silent. Crowley sleeps for most of it—when he wakes, Aziraphale is always quiet, looking straight out of the windshield, but he never releases his grip on Crowley’s hand.

They arrive at the cottage late in the evening. It’s a small, white-washed building, carefully shuttered and quiet. Aziraphale comes around to the side of the car and helps Crowley out.

Just moving makes Crowley’s head throb. It takes a lot longer than it should and by the time Airaphale lays him out on the couch, it’s taking everything he has not to throw up or pass out again. He stays there, trying to catch his breath, as Aziraphale begins turning on lights and putting their meager supplies away. Crowley's not sure how long it is before Aziraphale sits back down beside him. Time has started to lose any real meaning to him over the past week and he finds he struggles to keep track of it at all. 

"This really is a nice little place," Aziraphale tells him. He sits at the end of the sofa and props Crowley's feet in his lap. " I had no idea you had property outside of London, my dear." 

Crowley flushes and throws his arm over his face, covering his eyes. He's hardly about to tell Aziraphale that he bought it years ago, when the Apocalypse was still new and they believed Warlock was the Antichrist. He hadn't meant to. He's seen the owner’s advertisement in the newspaper quite by accident. He still isn't sure what possessed him to take a day off and make the long trek down, taking the place in cash before the old fellow selling it could get a word in edgewise. He hasn't even been here since. 

He just—Crowley's body, always too warm now, flushes even more. He’d just seen the tidy little ad and had a brief, blinding flash image of them there—Aziraphale taking his tea in a little garden, Crowley going on long drives down backwater county roads. Having dinner together in some of the little seaside shops, drinks under the stars. The sheer idea had blindsided him at the time, even more so how much he’d wanted it.

“Crowley?" 

Aziraphale’s hand curls around his ankle, thumb pressing absent-mindedly on the bone protruding over the top of Crowley’s sock. Crowley lets out a long breath. 

“I'm fine,” he says, an answer to Aziraphale’s unasked question. “I bought this place as a part of a job, never got around to selling it again.” 

Aziraphale doesn't seem to believe him, but he lets it go.

“I saw a fantastic little seafood restaurant on the drive in,” he says. “Shall we dine out tonight?” 

Crowley's body aches at the thought of standing, putting on his shoes, getting in the car and driving again. Sitting in public with so many humans, vulnerable and hurt, is an even worse idea. But he’s not going to say no to the hopeful gleam in Aziraphale’s eyes, that says _please pretend this is a normal holiday_. Crowley wants to give Aziraphale everything he can in the little time he has left. 

He reaches out and puts his hand over the one Aziraphale has on his ankle. 

“Sure,” he says. “Why not.”

* * *

They fall into a routine, of sorts, over the next several days. The cottage has only one bedroom, which is largely for Crowley. He spends the nights there, trying to sleep. It's difficult—the pain keeps him awake most nights and he barely manages more than a few hours.

On good mornings, he is strong enough to stumble out of bed to the kitchen on his own, using the walls for support, to find Aziraphale waiting for him in the kitchen. On bad days he can only wait in bed, miserable and exhausted, for Aziraphale to come and help him.

Aziraphale spends the mornings reading. They go out to the little plot in the backyard that had once been a garden and is now overgrown with wildflowers and weeds. Crowley stretches out on a rickety old bench that Aziraphale covers with a blanket, his head pillowed on Aziraphale’s thigh as Aziraphale reads to him .

Crowley's never been as big on books, but he likes listening to Aziraphale’s voice, the soothing ebb and flow of it as he drifts between waking and sleep. Aziraphale only chooses books he knows Crowley will enjoy - full of intrigue, treachery, cunning villains, and daring heroes. Happy endings, all.

In the afternoons, they take a daily walk. How long it takes depends entirely on Crowley. One day, they manage no more than twenty steps outside of the cottage, while another they make it all the way to the Seven Sisters. Walks, Aziraphale reminds Crowley every time they begin, are something humans have been using to stay healthy for ages. Crowley doesn't tell him that he doubts he can walk off holy water poisoning. Aziraphale knows that as well as Crowley does.

They eat dinner at the seafood restaurants near the cottage, dining among tourists and holidaymakers and traveling university students on break. No one really pays them that much attention, though several elderly ladies do talk to them on their way in or out to assure them of the healing power of the sea air, looking worriedly at Crowley the whole time. It's strange to be pitied by humans. 

At night sometimes, Crowley sits at the rickety stand-up piano they found shoved in a closet. It was out of tune, though it had quickly tuned itself the very first time Crowley had taken a seat to play. Whenever he sits down, he runs his fingers over the keys, leans back, and plays something half-remembered and dreamy. Aziraphale sit close by and listens, eyes closed and head tilted toward Crowley. 

When Crowley’s body begins to yearn for bed, Aziraphale helps him back to the bedroom, settles him under the cup oh, and tucks him in. He sits down in the hardback chair near the bed and folds his fingers over Crowley's. 

“Sleep, my dear,” he always says. “I’ll be here.”

It's not a bad life, Crowley thinks as the end of the first week approaches. If he didn't know it had an expiration date, if his body could stand on its own, if it wasn’t in such pain at every moment - then he could even call it perfect. He wishes he could pretend, even for just a little while. It would be nice to play that he and Aziraphale really are just on a well-earned holiday, to simply bask in Aziraphale’s extended attention and warm focus.

But it's impossible. Every day his body weakens further. He gets tired more and more easily. He can hardly keep down the food Aziraphale keeps insisting he eats, can barely even sleep. He's getting worse. He knows it and, from the way Aziraphale won't stop hovering over him every minute, he knows it too. He doubts Aziraphale has stopped looking for a solution, but he’s kept it quiet ever since Gabriel’s visit, as if he’s afraid to bring it up.

Crowley's death creeps after him on cat paws, silent and unstoppable. It's only a matter of time.

* * *

At the end of the week, one of the little old ladies who likes to stop and chat with Aziraphale tells him there will be a meteor shower that night.

“It’s not like the city,” she tells him with an honest distaste for the idea of London that Aziraphale finds refreshing. “You can really see them here! Try going out by the cliffs, it’s a lovely view. You can make a night of it with your young man.”

Neither Crowley nor Aziraphale are young men by any stretch of the imagination, but he imagines they must seem so to her, with her grey-white hair and heavily wrinkled face. He thanks her warmly, even though he can’t imagine Crowley will be up for an excursion. Even their daily walks are becoming too taxing for him now—yesterday, they barely made it past the Bentley. 

But when he brings it up to Crowley that afternoon, he brightens. “I haven’t seen one in ages,” he says. “Not since moving to London, at least.” He turns that look on Aziraphale. “Can we go?”

Aziraphale crumbles embarrassingly fast. “Yes,” he says. “Of course. Shall we pack something to eat?”

Crowley makes a face—food has been his enemy all the time he’s been sick—but nods. Aziraphale can sense his excitement for the rest of the day and it eases his weary heart to feel it for the first time in so long. Crowley’s felt like nothing but pain and exhaustion for days—to see him honestly happy is a balm to Aziraphale’s soul. He’s been happy too little recently.

They leave once darkness has truly set in, a picnic basket settled in the backseat of the Bentley. It’s not a far drive—as the old woman said, it’s barely even a far walk—but they both know Crowley won’t be able to make it. Thankfully, Crowley is happy enough about the excursion that it quenches his bitterness over his own body’s weakness.

They pick a quiet spot near the cliffs. There’s no one else around at all—even the nearest house is far down the road, a distant light on the hills. It’s very dark as they spread out the thick blanket on the ground and settle in. It’s cold, too. Aziraphale’s glad he thought to bring a second blanket for Crowley as he huddles in it, wrapped so thoroughly that only his head is visible. He isn’t wearing his glasses and the unobstructed outline of his face as he lifts it to the sky to examine the star is beautiful. Aziraphale allows himself to stare. 

He’s still researching. Crowley asked him to stop, so he no longer does it when Crowley is awake; instead he focuses all of his energy on Crowley. But when he is asleep or napping, Aziraphale continues his search through the books he’d squirreled away in his luggage. He is having no luck, still, and the thought tugs on him. They’re running out of time. Crowley grows weaker and sicker every day and Aziraphale still hasn’t found an answer.

“Angel! Look!” 

Aziraphale follows Crowley’s outstretched finger. He sees the twinkle of a meteor as it disappears on the horizon. 

“It’s lovely,” he says. “It must be starting soon.”

“We should lie back,” Crowley says, still looking off in the distance where the meteor disappeared. “We’ll be able to see them better.”

Aziraphale smiles at him. How had he ever spent so many years thinking Crowley loved nothing?

“All right, my dear,” he says. “Let’s lie back.”

The ground isn’t exactly comfortable, but the blanket helps. As they lie down, Crowley shifts until he is nearly touching Aziraphale, a long line of heat against Aziraphale’s side. Aziraphale lets out a long breath but Crowley doesn’t move any closer. For several long moments, they lie there, utterly still and quiet.

The sky above them is thick with stars, moonless. Aziraphale knows that this universe is huge, that the Earth is just one tiny piece of a much larger whole, but it still stuns him to look up and see it stretched out above his head, seemingly endless. His body seems much smaller, somehow. His awareness stretches out until all he can see are the stars and, through them, the universe. 

Something flashes, quick and bright. He hears Crowley’s gasp and comes back to himself a little. He turns his head, ignoring the disorientation at the sudden change in perspective, and smiles when he sees Crowley’s animated face so close, still tilted upwards. He really does love this, Aziraphale thinks and is fiercely glad to be the one to give it to him.

Another meteor must flash across the sky because Crowley gasps again, smiling, but Aziraphale doesn’t see it. He is far too busy looking at Crowley.

* * *

On the ride back to the cottage, Crowley talks of nothing but the stars. Aziraphale truly never realized how much Crowley seems to know about them—he is a fountain of information as they make their short drive back. He sounds so much more like his old self that Aziraphale’s heart aches when he stumbles and gasps as he tries to get out of the car. 

“Come on, my dear,” Aziraphale says, hefting him up. “I’ve got you.”

It’s much later than he normally puts Crowley to bed. Crowley’s already yawning as they go through what has become their nightly ritual. Aziraphale tucks Crowley in more carefully than usual, smoothing the thick duvet over his body with utter tenderness. He sits down in his chair and reaches for Crowley’s outstretched hand.

“Aziraphale,” Crowley says. “I have an idea.”

Crowley’s ideas, Aziraphale thinks, a little rueful, usually get Aziraphale into trouble—he’s come to regard that particular phrase with a rush in adrenaline. 

“What is it?”

The room is already dark and Crowley’s eyes are uncovered. They are still bright enough to see, even without any moonlight through the windows. He’s looking at Aziraphale.

“Come to bed,” he says.

Aziraphale’s body floods with heat. He coughs, taken off-guard. 

“I’m—”

But Crowley is shaking his head. Aziraphale can’t make it out quite clearly, but he thinks he’s going red. 

“No, I meant—try _sleep_ , angel. I want you to try to sleep tonight.”

Oh! Aziraphale contemplates the idea, ignoring his own disappointment over what Crowley _isn’t_ offering—there’s hardly any time for _that_ and Crowley’s in no shape besides. But sleep… Aziraphale does like watching Crowley as he wakes up, still groggy and defenseless. How much better would it be if he were to wake up with Crowley, both of them in bed together, nose to nose? Aziraphale shivers and he wants, suddenly and effortlessly, to try it.

“Very well,” he says.

Crowley starts. “What, really?” he asks, disbelieving.

“I might as well give it a go,” Aziraphale says. “It’s hardly the first human thing I’ve tried.”

He snaps his fingers so that he wears a set of pajamas that matches Crowley’s perfectly, though his are a charming plaid. Crowley scoots back as he slides under the warm covers. The bed is perfectly comfortable, the sheets soft and clean. Aziraphale shifts experimentally until he’s facing Crowley. This close, it’s much easier to see his face. 

“All right,” he says. “Now what?”

Crowley’s face creases with a fond smile. “Think of something nice,” he says. “Let go of everything else and sink down until you’re—asleep.”

“That’s all?” Aziraphale asks. “That seems too easy.”

“It’s much harder than you think,” Crowley tells him. “Go on, give it a go.”

Aziraphale frowns but acquiesces. He closes his eyes and deepens his breathing. For a long moment, he casts around for something, anything, that’s nice to think of. The last week or so has left him so tired and sad that it’s difficult to think of anything happy. He turns it over in his mind, growing more frustrated with every wasted second.

He opens his eyes to tell Crowley that it’s useless, but Crowley—is already asleep, mouth slightly open and relaxed, face slack. He breathes in evenly, though he wheezes a little on each exhale. 

Aziraphale traces his face with his eyes. Think of something nice, he tells himself and shuts his eyes firmly. He thinks of Crowley, alive and unhurt and radiantly happy, and falls asleep almost instantly.

* * *

_Aziraphale dreams._

He stands on a wide cliff that reminds him of the Seven Sisters, but there is no roiling sea stretching out below him—all he sees for kilometers is forest. But this is no modern forest, tidy and tamed and drowsy. The trees below him are huge and wide and verdant, humming with the squalls and roars of hidden life. The air around him is so crisp and clear it seems to clean out his lungs with every inhale; everything smells green.

This is not a new forest, no. This is a forest of the old times. Before inventions and humanity and animals, even.

Aziraphale realizes he is not wearing his tidy plaid pajamas anymore. Instead, he is dressed in the traditional white robes, wings open and spread out on his back. All he's missing is the flaming sword, but he figures that once you give that away, they don’t just give it back, even in dreams.

That's what this must be, a dream. Aziraphale’s never had one before, so he's not entirely sure.

“It's about time.”

Aziraphale turns. The woman coming toward him wears white robes too, but she has no wings. Her hair is long and dark, braided extensively, and her face is shrouded, all the features entirely obscured.

“Hello,” Aziraphale says, quite bemused. Did humans often get visitors in their dreams? “I'm sorry, did you just say, _about time_? Have you been waiting for me?”

“Obviously.” The woman has a crisp accent, all sharp corners “You’re terribly late. I thought I would have to do something drastic to get you here.”

“Oh dear.” Aziraphale wrings his hands. “I'm terribly sorry, only I didn't know anyone was waiting for me.”

“Well, that's fine.” The woman shrugs. Aziraphale can’t see her face, but he gets the impression that she’s smiling. “Now that you’re here, we can get down to business. _Finally_.”

“Business? Oh, my. But… I’m sorry, who _are_ you, exactly?”

“Oh, never mind that, we’ll never get anything done if I tell you that. Aziraphale, you _can_ save Crowley. It’s not too late, though it will soon be.”

Aziraphale stares at her. “You know Crowley?”

Her bark of laughter is as sharp as her accent. “Of course I do. I know _everything_.”

“How—”

“Never _mind_ that, I told you. We have more important things to discuss. You can save him—you _must_ —but you’re running out of time. Soon it really will be too late.”

“I don’t understand,” Aziraphale says.

The woman groans. “Why must you people always _understand_? Can't you simply accept my knowledge, guardian of the Eastern Gate?”

“But I _can’t_ …” Aziraphale swallows. “Saving Crowley, I’ve _tried_. I checked and there’s nothing I can find in any of my books—”

“Bah! Books.”

“—and Anathema and the prophecies—”

“Oh, _those_ old things. Helpful, but they’re hardly _necessary_.”

“—and Gabriel said—”

“Ugh.”

“Look.” Aziraphale crosses his arms over his chest and glares at her. “I have searched and searched. There’s no cure. Crowley is—he’s—” He swallows. Oh, he can’t say it. He can’t even look it in the eye.

The woman takes his hand in hers. Her palms are curiously warm, almost a perfect temperature to touch, but they also don’t feel quite solid. It’s like holding a cloud, almost. 

“Aziraphale,” she says. “You _can_ save him. I’m telling you there’s a way you can keep him from dying. You already know how.”

“I’ve looked—I’ve asked—”

“You’re looking in the wrong places. You’re asking the wrong questions. You know what to do, what you need to save him.”

“How?”

“Aziraphale. You _know_.”

Aziraphale rips his hand from hers. “I don’t! I’ve looked and looked and I’ve come up with _nothing_ , okay? Nothing! He’s wasting away before my very eyes and there’s nothing at all I can think of to stop it!” He frowns at her. “So if you’re telling me you know what to do, if you can help him, then _tell me_.”

“I can’t,” she says. She at least sounds sorry about it. “It must come from you.”

“What a load of—”

“It _must_. It’s a rule that’s existed since before the universe, Aziraphale. I cannot tell you. It must be your choice, your gift.”

Aziraphale turns away from her. “Then I don’t know what you’re even—”

“But! I may be able to give… _hints_.”

Aziraphale looks back. He can’t see her face, but it feels like the woman is staring hard at him. She tilts her head, encouraging him to come back to her.

“I don’t know what I can do that I haven’t tried already,” he says, turning back. 

“It _is_ what you’ve tried already.”

Aziraphale startles. “What? But—” He thinks back frantically. “When I… When I tried to heal him, you mean?”

The woman spreads her hands. Aziraphale frowns, thinking hard.

“But that didn’t even work, not really!”

“Do you think anyone’s ever managed to make holy water _pause_ in its path to destroying a demon?”

“Well—no, I suppose. But—”

“Aziraphale,” she says. “You and Crowley have existed together for most of the time this world has been around You have been two parts of a whole for almost 6,000 years. You stopped the Apocalypse together. Without you, he is unbalanced. Without him, so are you. You have a _connection_.”

Aziraphale stares at her. His mind takes all of the pieces she’s giving him and makes several different puzzles, each more startling than the last.

“You’re saying… It’s not just that I know how to save Crowley,” he says. “You’re saying I’m the only one who _can_? Whatever we need to do, it only works if I do it?”

“It only works if you do it because you’re the only one in this universe who loves Crowley enough _to_ do it.” She takes his hand again and Aziraphale lets her. “But you’re still asking the wrong questions, Aziraphale. Why is the holy water killing him?”

“He’s a demon,” Aziraphale says automatically.

“So how do you stop it?”

“You take it out of him.”

She lets out a long hiss through her teeth. “Wrong!”

He frowns at her. “What do you mean, _wrong_?”

“I mean, _wrong_.” She shakes her head. “Do you know that humans have these charming little illusions? If you look at them at a certain angle they make one picture and if you change the angle they become an entirely different picture. Reversible images.”

“Yes,” Aziraphale says, nonplussed by the change in subject. “I’ve seen one that was a young woman and an old woman at the same time. Remarkable.”

“Yes, well think of this problem as a reversible image. Right now, you’re seeing the young woman,” she says. “Change the angle, Aziraphale. See the old woman.”

Aziraphale stares at her shadowed, featureless face, her dark, shining hair. He turns the problem over, examining it from new and strange positions. Hunting for the different perspective, the secret, hidden picture. 

Oh. _Oh_.

“Oh, _Lord_ ,” he says. Euphoria races through him. “I know—Oh, I know it!”

“Yes?”

“All this time I’ve been focusing on the poison,” Aziraphale breathes out. “When what I really needed to focus on was _Crowley_.”

“Good,” she says. “That’s good, Aziraphale.” The world around them ripples. “You’re waking up. Time to go.”

“Wait,” he cries. “You still haven’t told me who you are! How do you know all of this? How are you _here_?”

“I told you—”

“It _does_ matter! We still don’t know who attacked Crowley, you could be one of them!”

“Never.” The disintegrating world around them grows darker for just a second. Aziraphale shivers, but in the next moment, it is full of green warmth again. “I would never do that. Not to Crowley.”

“Who _are_ you? Tell me, please—” 

The dream is really wavering now. The woman brings Aziraphale’s hands up to where her mouth should be, as if to kiss it.

“Oh, Aziraphale,” she says. “Have you been on Earth so long you’ve forgotten the voice of your Maker?”

Aziraphale freezes. His heart hammers in his chest even as the dream continues to slide away. 

“You’re—”

“Her. Yes.”

Aziraphale can’t question it. Her voice, he thinks dazedly. He does know her voice, even though it’s been so many thousands of years since he’s heard it.

“But if you really are… Then I’m even more confused. Crowley’s a demon, your enemy, why would you—”

“No, darling,” she says. “Crowley is not a demon to me or my enemy. He is my child, lost and far from home but not forgotten, never forgotten. He never stopped being mine—none of them did, even Lucifer. They may not remember, but I do.” She pauses, softens. “And once upon a time, your Crowley walked at my side and helped me sprinkle the stars amongst the heavens.”

The dream is only shards now. Aziraphale is pressing too close to the waking world. 

“You really want to save him?” he asks, one last desperate reassurance. 

“Of course,” she says without hesitation. “Even if he wasn’t mine, why wouldn’t I want to save him when you love him so, Aziraphale?”

The real world is even closer now, layered on top of the remnants of the dream. The last thing he sees as he comes fully into wakefulness is the impression of a smile, the idea of teeth in the woman’s shrouded face. 

“Oh, and Aziraphale? Can you give him a message?” The potential smile widens. “Tell him, _looking good_.”

_Aziraphale wakes_.

The bed is warm and Crowley sleeps next to him, wheezing a little on every exhale. Aziraphale takes several deep breaths to calm his racing heart. The dream is already fading fast from his memory, just as he’d always read dreams are wont to do. He needs to act quickly before he forgets entirely.

_Without you, he’s unbalanced,_ she’d said. _Her_! But Aziraphale can spare his amazement at receiving a message from God Herself once he’s fixed Crowley. He thinks back hard to the initial moments after the stabbing, the feeling of pulling hard at the toxin he felt in Crowley. That is the key, the thing that can fix him. But how? It didn’t work last time, he thinks. 

He’d always thought he needed to do something to the poison, change it or extract it somehow. But what if, he thinks, taking something away isn’t what he needs to do to fix Crowley. Maybe what Crowley needs is to _get_ something.

See the old woman, he thinks. Aziraphale knows what to do.

He takes Crowley’s lax hands and several deep breaths as he steels himself. This will probably hurt. Then, with an open heart, he reaches deep into the core of himself, the very center of his being—past the human flesh entirely—and _pulls_.

* * *

Crowley wakes to a wash of golden light. He blinks up at it, utterly bemused.

“What?” he tries to say, turning to look at where Aziraphale had fallen asleep next to him last night.

Aziraphale’s still there. But he isn’t staring up at the light like Crowley. His eyes are screwed shut, forehead crinkled. The light isn’t just around him—it’s _coming_ from him, bursting out of their locked hands. Crowley tries to pull away, alarmed at the concentration on Aziraphale’s face. What is he _doing_? 

“Angel?” he asks. “Angel, what—?”

“Shut it,” Aziraphale whispers through gritted teeth. “I’m concentrating here.”

Crowley sowls at him. “You’re trying to heal me again!” he says, offended. “Didn’t we agree it was useless, you—” 

“Quiet, Crowley!”

Crowley tries to pull his hands away again, but Aziraphale has a death grip on his fingers. Crowley scowls. Aziraphale gasps and the golden light gets brighter and brighter, until they have their own sun in the run with them and then— 

It rushes, fierce and lightning-fast, into Crowley.

Crowley gasps, back arching. For a brief moment, he feels like a balloon with too much air, as if someone could press him right and he would pop. The light fills him and fills him and it’s not painful but it burns, it _aches_ — 

He exhales. Something dark comes out from him, slick and poisonous with malice. It escapes through his nose and mouth in one continuous stream. Crowley can’t breathe, can barely think, and just as it begins to overwhelm him, the black essence is gone and he's left gasping for air on the bed.

“Crowley? Crowley!”

Aziraphale’s frantic hands travel over his face, examining him at length. Crowley feels strung-out like he’s run for kilometers, but he doesn’t—he isn’t—

He stares up at Aziraphalle’s worried face with awe.

“It’s gone,” he breathes.

Aziraphale stares at him, one hand still curled around Crowley’s chin, the other trapping his ear. Then, he begins to smile, so broadly and brightly it’s almost like the golden light is back in the room. His grip tightens on Crowley’s face and they are, without warning, kissing. Aziraphale’s mouth is warm, his lips chapped. He’s laughing as he pulls away, wild and unhurried and free.

“It worked! It really, really worked—”

It takes Crowley a moment to notice the tears, dazed as he is by the kiss. He frowns in alarm, reaching up to brush them away.

“Angel, what—?”

Aizrphale buries his head in Crowley’s neck with a great cry. All of the breath in Crowley’s body whooshes out of him, but he puts his arms around Aziraphale automatically, running a light hand down his trembling back.

“Aziraphale—”

“Oh, Lord,” Aziraphale says into Crowley’s neck. “I was so afraid I’d lost you, Crowley. Oh, God. You’re okay, you’re okay—” 

Crowley presses a kiss to Aziraphale’s hair.

“You did it, angel.” He curls his arms more tightly around Aziraphale’s body and closes his hair. “You did it.”

* * *

They sit up for a cup of tea, after. Crowley finds moving on his own, unassisted and without any pain, to be remarkably strange. His body feels oddly light, almost buoyant. 

“You’re cracked,” he tells Aziraphale. “No one’s seen Her in ages. No way did She just drop in your dreams for a quick chat about how to save _my_ life.”

“I swear!” Aziraphale says. He’s drinking his tea, but he clutches Crowley’s other hand with a death grip. “She said… She said I was the one who had to do it. I think She’s right—I don’t know that anyone else would have done.” He offers Crowley a slightly tearful smile. "And She said to tell you, _looking good_."

“And now you’re going to tell me exactly what it is you _did_ , right? I’m pleased to be off death’s door and everything, but all that business in the bedroom—”

Crowley’s pretty sure Aziraphale remembers the kiss at the exact same time he does, because he flushes. Crowley feels a little overheated himself but he stares determinedly at Aziraphale. He needs to _know_ and Azirphale’s been pussyfooting around his explanation with all this talk of dreams and _Her_. 

“She was right,” Aziraphale says. “I was looking at the problem all wrong. Seeing the young woman, not the old woman.”

“What?”

“You were being poisoned by holy water because you were a demon,” Aziraphale explains. “I thought that meant I had to take the holy water out of you or change it somehow. I didn’t understand that what I needed to change was _you_.”

An inkling begins in the back of Crowley’s mind. “Change _me_?”

“I think I almost did it back when I tried to heal you, but I was going in the opposite direction—trying to pull from you. But that wasn’t going to help at all! What you needed was to get something _from_ me—my essence.”

Crowley stares. “No,” he says. “You can’t be serious.”

Aziraphale stares back at him. “If I couldn’t change the holy water, I could change _you_ ,” he says. “If you’re not a demon anymore, its effect on you doesn’t work anymore.”

“Then, with the light—?”

“I gave you some of my soul. You’re not an angel, but you’re not a demon anymore, not really— you’re too holy for that now. Holy water won’t work on you, not anymore.”

“Angel, that’s—” Crowley can barely speak. This is too big. “You can’t just _give_ me your soul, you idiot!”

Aziraphale has the nerve to roll his eyes. “I’d do more to keep you alive, Crowley. I’m just sorry I didn’t think of it sooner. I could’ve spared you a lot of pain.”

“Think of it _sooner_ !” Crowley sputters. “Angel, this is your _soul_. Your essence! You shouldn’t have given it to me at _all_! I’m a _demon_ —”

“Not anymore.”

“Don’t push your bloody technicalities at me,” Crowley says. “You can’t give it to me, Aziraphale. I don’t—” He doesn’t deserve it. 

Aziraphale tightens his grip on Crowley’s fingers. “Dear, you already own my heart,” he says. “What’s a little bit of my soul on top of that?”

Crowley stares at him, stunned speechless. Aziraphale smiles at him a little, eyes crinkling at the corners. He lifts Crowley’s hand to his mouth and presses a firm kiss to it. 

“Well then you should get some of my soul, too,” Crowley’s idiot mouth says before his brain can stop it. Aziraphale freezes, staring at him. Crowley scowls back, neck heating, but he doesn’t take it back. “It’s only _fair_ ,” he says, “since you’ve got my heart too, you know.”

His hand is still pressed to Aziraphale’s mouth, so he feels the long exhale he makes against the thin skin there. Crowley shivers, suddenly remembering a promise he’d made back in Aziraphale’s apartment. 

“I think… I think I already have part of your soul, my dear.”

“ _What_?” Crowley asks, attention diverted. “ _How_?”

“When I first tried to heal you, I was pulling from you,” Aziraphale says. “I was trying to pull the holy water, but by that time it was already merged with you—so I think I got some of _you_ in the process.”

Crowley stares at him. Aziraphale smiles at him, rueful. “Looks like you’re stuck with me, too, my dear.”

“Angel, there’s no one I’d rather be stuck with,” he says with feeling. 

Aziraphale colors and clears his throat. “We should sleep,” he says. “It’s been a long night and you still need to recover. It’ll be a few days before you get your full strength back, I think.”

Crowley takes him in—his pale hair and blue eyes and rumpled pajamas. The night is quiet outside, still dark and still. The cottage smells of herbs and wood, old paint and dust. It’s a little cold—goosebumps rise along Crowley’s arm. 

His heart is beating, beating, beating. He’s alive and he’s here, now, with Aziraphale in their quiet cottage, holding hands. Alive.

“Can we go out, instead?” he asks. “I want to look at the stars.”

“Of course, my dear,” Aziraphale says. 

They stand. As they approach the door, Aziraphale shifts his grip and interlaces his fingers with Crowley’s. When Crowley glances over at him, his smile is deep and private, contented. 

“Let’s go,” Aziraphale says. “We have all the time in the world.”

They go out of the door into the night, holding hands. 

**Author's Note:**

> the quoted song is "only you (and you alone)" by the platters. 
> 
> so i don't know that i actually buy into the crowley-was-raphael theory that was thrown around back when the show aired but i liked it enough to include it in here once i decided there would be a gabriel scene. i'm pretty sure crowley doesn't actually remember his time as an angel but i thought it'd make the scene more fun if he did. 
> 
> i didn't want to actually answer the question of who attacked crowley bc i've been toying with a sequel. however, i don't think it's really that important if you want to read this fic as a stand-alone - just imagine some disgruntled demons who managed to get their hands on holy water and leave it at that. 
> 
> thanks for reading! kudos & comments always welcome.


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